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TALES FROM THE CITY: Venice
words DAVID TERRIEN After only a few hours in Venice – that of abstractly painted transparent
singular test of one’s tolerance for Plexiglas that cantilevers from
exploring without a map and witnessing its steel stand to entirely fill
the unholy sight of pigeons scrabbling the top-floor central gallery’s
for birdseed in the hair of I’m- view out over the Grand Canal.
enjoying-it-now-but-I-might-have-to-
scream-in-a-moment tourists – it’s Unexpected and rewarding highlights
hard not to filter every thought and include 11 works from the early to
experience through the ancient city’s mid-1960s by French artist Martial
whorl of canals and passageways that Raysse, interspersed, across several
may lead nowhere but may also get you galleries, with recent work by Anselm
to exactly where you want to go. Reyle (who credits Raysse, now 71, as
an influence). One masterful piece by
Take the Palazzo Grassi, currently host Reyle, the neon installation Untitled
to Sequence 1, the second exhibition (2006), fills half its gallery with
(following last year’s Where Are a knot of curling and rectlinear
We Going?) of works selected from arterial reds, candy colours and a
François Pinault’s vast contemporary green the shade of a suburban 1950s
art holdings. It is a collection whose sofa, yet collapses, on viewing, from
home should, by all rights, be opening an exuberant three dimensions into an
several years from now near Paris on almost impossibly crisp plane –
an island in the Seine. Instead a trick of perception attended, on
Pinault, growing tired of obstacles the day of my visit, by the second-
to his French plans, turned to Venice, most vigilant museum guard I have
purchasing an 80 percent stake in the come across (first prize goes to the
Palazzo Grassi from Fiat in 2005 and team defending Fischer’s stumbling
quickly converting it, with the help of pack of Camel Lights, Nach Jugendstiel
architect Tadao Ando, into a space that kam Roccoko, 2006, one floor down).
met its new owner’s immediate needs.
Any dissatisfaction resulting from a
visit to the Palazzo Grassi is likely First prize goes to the
to originate in the inescapably blue-
chip richness of the underlying museum guards defending
collection and a lack of space in which
to meaningfully display it, rather Urs Fischer’s stumbling
than Gingeras’s curatorial decisions.
Pinault’s successful bid, over the pack of Camel Lights
Guggenheim, for a 30-year tenancy of
the Punta della Dogana site earlier
this year changes at least the second
Leaving aside, for the moment, any part of the equation. Long coveted
thoughts about the kind of character by the Guggenheim, the former customs
that looks to Venice for an escape from warehouse offers 3,500 square metres
bureaucracy, it should be said that of space and – sited in the shadow
Pinault curator Alison M. Gingeras has of the Santa Maria della Salute dome
assembled an exhibition that is sure and facing St Mark’s, the Arsenale
to exceed the needs of the typical art and the Giardini – represents a major
tourist (mostly the non-pigeon-wearing prize for someone wishing to stake
variety). Working with free rein and a bigger claim on the Venice art map.
outstanding primary materials, Gingeras
departs, to a certain degree, from a Whether construed as a tale of politics
greatest-hits approach, eschewing an and backroom manoeuvring, a reminder
overt narrative for a mischievous and of the cultural significance of
self-referential air that is broadcast great industrial fortunes or merely
primarily through the works of Urs a lesson in natural selection, this
Fischer, Franz West and Rudolf Stingel. story of Pinault and the Palazzo
In addition to the pick of pieces from Grassi’s success over a larger and
a collection of 2,500 works, Gingeras more august institution is fittingly
includes several newly commissioned played out in Venice. The Guggenheim,
pieces, the most impressive of which meanwhile, turns its attention
is Kristin Baker’s freestanding to another artificial island, that
Flying Curve, Differential Manifold of Abu Dhabi’s Saadiyat, and another
(2007), a nine-metre curving expanse museum design by Frank Gehry.
ARTREVIEW four.linsix.lin
p046 Dispatches AR Jul07.indd 46 11/6/07 20:09:06
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