{"id":43627,"date":"2022-05-10T22:16:19","date_gmt":"2022-05-10T20:16:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.veneziadavivere.com\/the-milk-of-dreams-by-cecilia-alemani-the-firsts-of-the-venice-biennale\/"},"modified":"2026-03-25T13:47:25","modified_gmt":"2026-03-25T12:47:25","slug":"the-milk-of-dreams-by-cecilia-alemani-the-firsts-of-the-venice-biennale","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.veneziadavivere.com\/en\/the-milk-of-dreams-by-cecilia-alemani-the-firsts-of-the-venice-biennale\/","title":{"rendered":"The Milk of Dreams by Cecilia Alemani: The Firsts of the Venice Biennale"},"content":{"rendered":"

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The 59th International Art Exhibition of the Venice Biennale The Milk of Dreams<\/i>, from April 23 to November 27, 2022, opened by setting records and celebrating “firsts” <\/span><\/h2>\n

In 127 years of history, Cecilia Alemani<\/b>\u2014director since 2011 of High Line Art<\/a> in New York\u2014is the first Italian woman to curate the Venice Biennale<\/strong>; after directing Le Muse Inquiete<\/i><\/a> in 2020 alongside the other directors, and having been curator in 2017 of the Italian Pavilion with the exhibition Il mondo magico<\/i>. <\/p>\n

For the 2022 Biennale, Cecilia Alemani has involved 213 artists from 58 nations<\/b>, of which 180 were selected to demonstrate an openness removed from market scenes, residing in marginal countries and participating in a Biennale for the first time.<\/p>\n

80 national participations<\/b> exhibiting at the Giardini, the Arsenale, and throughout the city. 8 new pavilions<\/strong> have joined the long list of participants: Republic of Cameroon, Namibia, Nepal, Sultanate of Oman, Uganda, Republic of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Uzbekistan.<\/p>\n

1,433 works<\/b> and objects are present at the exhibition, with 80 new projects<\/b> or recent creations, some site-specific.<\/p>\n

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Women and Fashion at the Biennale<\/h3>\n

A first for the significant female presence at this Biennale<\/strong>: estimated at a solid 80%<\/strong>. In the media, this edition has been defined as a “female Biennale,” although its curator emphasizes a different perspective: “no one has ever considered Robert Storr’s 2007 Biennale ‘masculine’<\/em>.” <\/p>\n

The percentage highlights an attempt to change course: in the first 100 years of the Exhibition’s history, women artists did not even reach 10%, and only in the last 20 years has it hovered around +10%. Today’s 80% of female protagonists is to be considered a clear record. <\/p>\n

Beyond the large number of artists and works, high<\/strong> fashion<\/strong> also has a significant presence at this Biennale: Valentino<\/strong><\/a> is the main sponsor of the Italian Pavilion<\/strong> curated by Eugenio Viola<\/strong> with the chiromantic title: Storia della Notte e Destino delle Comete<\/em>, represented by a single artist, Gian Maria Tosatti<\/strong> (for the first time in the event’s history), the Biennale’s sponsors: Dior<\/strong><\/a>, which during the opening days chose Teatro La Fenice<\/strong> for its exclusive gala dinner, Swatch<\/strong><\/a> at the Giardini with an installation by Thai artist Navin Rawanchaikul<\/strong>, Burberry<\/b><\/a> for the Great Britain Pavilion.
\nLouis Vuitton<\/strong><\/a> presents the collateral exhibition Apollo, Apollo<\/em> by Katharina Grosse<\/strong>, and Prada<\/strong><\/a> the complex exhibition Human Brains. It Begins with an Idea<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Major fashion houses are increasingly connecting with art, addressing themes concerning the individual, culture, and society: the Zeitgeist of the Biennale in a fashion variant.<\/p>\n

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Winning Figures and Outsiders of the Biennale<\/h3>\n

The Milk of Dreams<\/i> brings its otherworldly creatures (by Leonora Carrington<\/strong> and others) in figures of transformation, metamorphosis, surreal, androgynous, and mechanical bodies\u2014multifaceted definitions of the human.<\/p>\n

Black art wins<\/strong> with the Golden Lion to<\/strong> Simone Leigh<\/b>, the African American representing the United States with her great mothers and the spectacular hut-like covering of the pavilion, including the large bronze bust ready to welcome us at the Arsenale: Brick House<\/i>, chosen by Alemani herself in 2019 to inaugurate the High Line Plinth in New York.<\/p>\n

Golden Lion for Best National Participation to Great Britain<\/strong> with first-timer Sonia Boyce<\/b>, who through Feeling Her Way<\/i> offers a different reading of people’s stories, in this case of five female musicians, through sound.<\/p>\n

And it is sound that dominates the Australian Pavilion<\/b>: the artist of Italian origin, Marco Fusinato<\/b>, performed with an electric guitar, with his back to the audience, in a musical performance of extreme and hypnotic volume, while a full-wall LED screen projects “disconnected and disparate randomly generated<\/i>” black-and-white images.<\/p>\n

It is a truly demanding pavilion due to its excessive and unbearable volume, which acoustically recalls the experiments of nearly a century ago by the Surrealist Luigi Russolo in Serenata per intonarumori e strumenti<\/i>. But the Biennale experience, as we know, is demanding. <\/p>\n

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Exhibitions Within the Exhibition<\/h3>\n

If context arises from memory, the tireless Alemani for the 59th edition presents five exhibitions within the exhibition<\/b>, the “time capsules”: “in dialogue between past and contemporary, even across many generations, also including many counter-histories and stories of exclusion<\/i>.”<\/p>\n

Installation designed by FormaFantasma<\/b><\/a>, these temporal treasures are divided: three at the Central Pavilion in the Giardini della Biennale and two at the Arsenale.<\/p>\n

At the Central Pavilion, La culla della strega<\/i>, title of a work by Maya Derain<\/b>, is dominated by “rebel<\/strong>” (for their era) artists, dancers\u2014featuring a video of Jos\u00e9phine Baker<\/strong> dancing\u2014and writers, who play with the ambiguity of the body in contrast to the golden Renaissance concept; Tecnologie dell’Incanto<\/i> exploring the relationship between body and technology with Grazia Varisco, Laura Grisi, Nanda Vigo, Dadamaino<\/b>, and Marina Apollonio<\/b>; and Corpo Orbita<\/i> inspired by the exhibition Materializzazione del linguaggio<\/i>, from 1978 curated by Mirella Bentivoglio<\/b>, featuring artists from the 19th and 20th centuries.<\/p>\n

At the Arsenale, with a long title citing the book by science fiction writer Ursula K. Le Guin<\/b>: Una foglia, una zucca, un guscio, una rete, una borsa, una bisaccia, una bottiglia, una pentola, una scatola, un contenitore.<\/i> Displayed are the sinuous and graceful forms of Ruth Asawa<\/b>, the human-carapaces of Surrealist Bridget Tichenor<\/b>, and the interesting studies of Aletta Jacobs<\/b>, the first woman admitted to a Dutch university and for a long time the only one to practice medicine in the Netherlands, with papier-m\u00e2ch\u00e9 uterus models on display describing different stages of pregnancy: studies used for her awareness campaigns on female body consciousness.<\/p>\n

And finally, La seduzione del cyborg<\/i>, title taken from a work by Liner Sharmlison<\/b>, which shows visions of 20th-century works in combinations between human and robotic.<\/p>\n

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A monumental exhibition that sees for the first time the emergence of conversations, questions, and dreams, after two years of closure and restrictions, as the curator herself mentions, who throughout the research and study phase looked at the world “from my little room in my New York apartment because I was practically never able to travel. But I still had the opportunity to meet hundreds and hundreds of artists, via Zoom<\/i>.”<\/p>\n

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The 59th edition of the International Art Exhibition of the Venice Biennale<\/strong> opened on April 23 and will remain open until November 27, 2022<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

The artistic direction is by the Italian Cecilia Alemani<\/strong>, who chose as the title of the event The Milk of Dreams<\/em><\/strong>.
\nEverything on the website labiennale.org<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Everything about the awards and Golden Lions at the 2022 Venice Art Biennale: continue reading here<\/strong><\/a>.<\/p>\n

Article by Lucia Pecoraro.
\nPhotos by Marta Formentello and Lucia Pecoraro.
\n<\/em><\/p>\n

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[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text] The 59th International Art Exhibition of the Venice Biennale The Milk of Dreams, from April 23 to November 27, 2022, opened by setting records and celebrating “firsts” In 127 years of history, Cecilia Alemani\u2014director since 2011 of High Line Art in New York\u2014is the first Italian woman to curate the Venice Biennale; after directing […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":26721,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[146,147,88,84],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-43627","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-biennale","category-culture","category-fashion","category-news","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.veneziadavivere.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43627","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.veneziadavivere.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.veneziadavivere.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.veneziadavivere.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/14"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.veneziadavivere.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=43627"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.veneziadavivere.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43627\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":43629,"href":"https:\/\/www.veneziadavivere.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43627\/revisions\/43629"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.veneziadavivere.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/26721"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.veneziadavivere.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=43627"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.veneziadavivere.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=43627"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.veneziadavivere.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=43627"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}