Observer’s Venice Biennale 2022 Picks
This year’s Venice Biennale is jam-packed with artists from all over the world, particularly women. We picked a few must visits.
Read MoreIf you're lucky enough to be basking in the Italian sunshine while you anxiously await the beginning of the Venice Biennale, this list is for you. This year's biennale is no easy feat to summarize, the art world is completely back in gear and artists from all over the globe are showing work at the biennale or its satellite exhibitions.
'Mary of Ill Fame' (2020-2021) by Tourmaline
- Arsenale
New York City art star Tourmaline is known for her gorgeous films full of deep color and emotion that portray queer figures in history at new angles. Her 25-minute short follows a fictional story concerning Mary Jones, a real-life Black trans sex worker living in Seneca Village in the 1830s.
"Claude Cahun and Marcel Moore: I Owe You" exhibition
- Galleria Alberta Pane
Claude Cahun and Marcel Moore as individuals had remarkable careers; as a couple they historically serve as the queer dynamic duo the art world always needed. This exhibit running at Galleria Alberta Pane celebrates the artist couple's prolific collaboration, through the first half of the 20th Century.
'Sirens' (2019-2020) by Nan Goldin
- Central Pavilion
Iconic artist and legendary archiver of her own life Nan Goldin has mixed things up with her film Sirens. Entirely made of found footage, clips from her favorite movie, the film is scored by Mica Levi. The collaboration aims to induce an almost hypnotic and high state for the audience.
The Flower of William Stringer (1866) by Georgiana Houghton
- Central Pavilion
Spiritualist artist Georgiana Houghton created many "spirit drawings" where she would attempt to communicate what she felt the Divine relayed to her, including The Flower of William Stringer. Viewing her arts practice as inherent to her relationship with the other world, her work has an almost heavenly element to it.
Mónica de Miranda's "no longer with the memory but with its future" exhibition
- Oratorio di San Ludovico
Artist Mónica de Miranda's first solo exhibition is opening with the biennale at Oratorio di San Ludovico. An interdisciplinary Portuguese artist with roots in Angola, her work investigates identity and place, with her video Path to the Stars shot at Angola's River Kwanza. Confronting narratives around how climate and colonialism shape the world around us, the exhibition features text, video, and photography.