There is always a glass of sea to sail in.
The 29th São Paulo Bienal, the city’s traditional bi-annual art exhibition, is scheduled to open for the general public on September 25. The event will feature some 200 works of 148 artists and will be held until December 12 at the Ibirapuera Pavilion. The exhibition, under general curators Moacir dos Anjos and Agnaldo Farias and co-curators Fernando Alvim, Rina Carvajal, Yuko Hasegawa, Sarat Maharaj and Chus Martinez, intends to simultaneously be a celebration of the artistic and an affirmation of its responsibility towards life and society.
To state the tight and ambiguous link between art and politics, the 29th São Paulo Bienal borrows this year’s title from the verses of poet Jorge de Lima’s “Invenção de Orfeu” (The Invention of Orpheus” - 1952): “There is always a glass of sea to sail in”, a verse that suggests that art’s utopian dimension is contained in itself and not in what is outside or beyond it.
29th São Paulo Bienal - The time and the place
The 29th São Paulo Bienal will be a gathering of artists from many countries, with a strong presence of Latin American artists. This reflects the time and place from which it is thought of: from Brazil and from the time of rapid global geopolitical reorganization. The exhibition has no hierarchies, bringing together recent works and those created many years ago. “Historical” works, therefore, are not included in the 29th São Paulo Bienal as mere “documents” of past times, but for their importance in understanding the world today.
“Terreiros”
The exhibition will not be merely contemplative. It will offer visitors several different manners of experimenting the transforming power of art. For this purpose, six meeting spaces will be built. In addition to offering places to make a pause in before continuing the visit to the show, they will be used for a variety of activities such as talks, screenings, performances and readings. They will be called “terreiros”, or yards, taking visitors to the squares, plazas, terraces, temples and courtyards, open or closed spaces that are found all over Brazil, where people dance, fight, sing, play games or instruments, cry, talk or ritualize the country’s hybrid religiosity.
Specific matters from each one of these spaces created by guest architects and artists and from the programs they harbor will be stated and discussed, clearly placing the deep and diverse presence of art in life. The performance terreiro called “O Outro, O Mesmo” (“The Other, The Same”) borrows its name from a book by Argentine writer Jorge Luís Borges and will be developed by architect Carlos Teixeira. The terreiro called “A pele do invisível” (“The skin of the invisible”) will be signed by Slovenian artist Tobias Putrih. Architect Roberto Loeb and graffiti artist Kboco will create a discussion and conversation space in the “Dito, não dito, interdito” (“Said, not said, interdicted”) terreiro, evoking the works of writer Guimarães Rosa. In addition, the architects of Amsterdam’s UN Studio will create spaces for discursive activities in a terreiro called “Eu sou a rua” (“I am the street”), a tribute to Carioca journalist and columnist João do Rio. It is a text by São Paulo writer and playwright Antonio Bivar that lends its name to the “Longe daqui aqui mesmo” (“Far from here right here”) terreiro designed by artists Marilá Dardot and Fábio Morais, a mixture of library and labyrinth. Lastly, the “Lembrança e esquecimento” (“Remembrance and forgetfulness”) terreiro designed by Ernesto Neto will be used as a space for breathing, reflection and rest.
As the discursive activities in the 29th São Paulo Bienal are part of the programs of the “Eu sou a rua” and “Dito, não dito, interdito” terreiros, they will not follow the traditional format of the previous Bienal conferences and seminars, which were concentrated in a single day. On the contrary, they will be spread over the exhibition’s entire opening period. The schedules of each one of the terreiros will demand the participation of a greater number of artists in the 29th São Paulo Bienal, in addition to those included in the exhibition area. The complete list of these artists will be released at a date to be announced later.
Schedule
September 20 – Preview
From 9 AM to 5 PM (media)
September 21 – Preview
From 9 AM to 5 PM (media)
7 PM: Preopening for institutional, artistic and other guests
September 22 to 24
7 PM: Sponsors’ guests
September 22 and 23
Morning and afternoon: Teachers (educational program)
September 25
10 AM: Official opening of the 29th São Paulo Bienal
December 12
Closing of the 29th São Paulo Bienal