American Pavilion, United States at Venice Biennale of Art - United States Pavilion, Giardini, Castello - City of Venice
(Photo: © Thierry Bal and © Zineb Sedira)
Exhibition in progress from April 23rd to November 27th 2022
The 59th Biennale Arte will open to the public on 23 April. But on the 20th, 21st and 22nd there will be the various openings and collateral events that always suddenly animate the Venetian artistic life. The awards ceremony will take place on the day of the opening to the public.
The title of the 59th edition of the Biennale d'Arte is Il Latte dei Sogni that means The Milk of Dreams.
The invited artists are 213 from 58 countries. There are 26 Italian artists, 180 the first participations in the International Exhibition, 1433 the works and objects on display, 80 new productions.
In all, 80 nations will participate in the Venice Biennale in the pavilions at the Giardini, the Arsenale and in the historic center of Venice.
Go to the page of the 59th Venice Art Biennale
French Pavilion, France at 59th Biennale Arte of Venice
The title of the exhibition at the French Pavilion is Dreams Have No Titles.
Artists: Zineb Sedira.
Curators: Sam Bardaouil and Till Fellrath.
Commissioner: Institut français.
Seat: French Pavilion, Giardini - Venice
Press Release of French Pavilion
The French Pavilion presents Zineb
Sedira�s multidisciplinary exhibition,
an immersive installation consisting
of film, sculpture, photography, sound
and collage. In line with her practice
to date, Sedira uses autobiographical
narrative, fiction and documentary
to shed light on past and present
international solidarities related
to historical liberation struggles.
Her contribution serves as a
cautionary tale about the failure of
an emancipatory promise which,
for many people, remains an
unfulfilled, not to say an impossible
dream.
In Dreams Have No Titles, the artist
addresses a major turning point in
the history of cultural, intellectual
and avant-garde production of
the 1960s, 1970s and beyond, in
France, Italy and Algeria especially.
She focuses on a repertoire of
remarkable cinematographic coproductions and filmmaking, in
particular activist ones, which
had an impact on postcolonial
movements.
During several visits to the archives of the Algerian Cin�math�que, she continued to mine
the country�s incredible film heritage, which hardly ever gets a mention in the history of
the cinematographic avant-gardes. Postindependence cinema in France, Italy
and Algeria adhered to the so-called
�Third-World� values and aesthetics,
which amounted to a true revolution
on the big screen. Throughout her
life, Zineb Sedira felt close to this
militant and anti-colonial movement
inspired by the Cuban model, showing
a political courage that she considers
to be an important manifestation of
solidarity at that time, and which she
hopes to reactivate today.
In the course of her tremendous
research at various international
cinema archives, Sedira came across the
1964 documentary Les Mains libres
(otherwise known as Tronc de figuier)
by the Italian director Ennio Lorenzini
at the AAMOD (The Audiovisual
Archive of the Democratic and Labour
Movement). The first known film
to be produced in the then newly
independent Algeria, it had since
disappeared from the screen and from memory.
Moreover, in Dreams Have No Titles, her film for the French Pavilion, she inserts mise en
abyme-like re-enactments and �makings of� film scenes, in which she constructs real
movie sets and keeps track of the days when these sequences were shot.
Zineb Sedira recalls: �I also relate the notion of remake to that of mise en abyme, which
often crops up in my work. I myself am an artist-director making a film about films.
My personal history is the starting point for a mise en abyme of the history of cinema
by means different strategies designed to create a fiction-reality�. Sedira�s theme of
appropriation is questioned from the very opening scene of her film, referring to Orson
Welles� F for Fake and the director�s claim that �This film is about trickery�. With this
in mind, Zineb Sedira also foregrounds the story of her own life, that of her family and
of her community, ranging from the critique of colonial legacies to the ongoing debate
about displacement and integration, vulnerability and resilience, as well as our ability to
dream. Sedira sees herself as a kind of accidental actor, a famous filmmaker, a fake faker
in search of real truth, challenging questions of authorship and authenticity. Two
questions keep cropping up: who is writing (his)tory and for whom?
The artist uses music, film,
literature, and other creative means
to tackle the question of freedom,
the struggle for liberation and other
forms of resistance, and to fight
against discrimination, colonisation
and racism. By highlighting
existing North-South solidarity
networks, Sedira goes resolutely
beyond the bipolar East-West
division of the Cold War period or
the Third World approach, drawing
on her personal experiences with
her family and her intellectual
artistic community.
Zineb Sedira�s exhibition mirrors
a �ball� to which she invites her
spectatorsè to see her dance
in order to resist, to mourn,
perchance to dream. And her
dreams have no titles.
Useful information for the visit
Hours:
Gardens from 10.00 to 19.00. Arsenale from 10.00 to 19.00 (from 10.00 to 20.00 on Friday and Saturday until September 30th). Closed on Mondays (except May 13, September 2, November 18).
Tickets: please visit the official website.
Phone: +39.041.5218711; fax +39.041.5218704
E-mail: [email protected]
Web: Biennale
of Venice |
