The Afro-American artist Simone Leigh and Great Britain, represented by the British Afro-Caribbean Sonia Boyce, were awarded. The silver lion to the Lebanese Ali Cherri. Special mentions to France and Uganda. Italy empty-handed
The lionesses ofAfrica they find in the Venice Lagoon the ideal territory for their every redemption. The two Golden Lions of the Biennale and the two pavilions that received an honorable mention all present works by black artists. Some of which are here to represent the major Western countries: Great Britain, France and even the United States, a sign that the integration evidently acquired is a sign of a precise cultural orientation of the Venetian institution. On the other hand, no prize goes to Italy.
The Golden Lion for the best pavilion of the 59 Biennale, open to the public with a record crowd from 23 April, was awarded by minister Dario Franceschini to Great Britain (Feeling Her Way), with prize collected by the exhibited artist Sonia Boyce, Afro-Caribbean, who works with other black women and suggests a contemporary language – said the jury – with many voices and sounds to create a choir with different points of view. a historic moment, the artist said moved. It’s not just me that’s giving women a voice. I thank the women who started working on these projects in the mid-twentieth century, she said, crying. the first time, in more than a hundred years, that Great Britain has entrusted its pavilion to a black artist.
The Golden Lion for the best artist of the international exhibition The milk of dreamscurated by Cecilia Alemani, went to the African American, of Jamaican origin, Simone Leigh (delivered by the president of the Veneto Region, Luca Zaia). Leigh, who won with a monumental sculpture made with virtuosity and powerfully suggestive, also the artist to whom he entrusted the pavilion of United States: a Palladian-style building, according to the schemes of white Renaissance architecture, transformed into a hut with a thatched roof as an indictment against colonialism and Western hegemony. Collecting the award, Leigh thanked her daughter for helping her become a better person than her.
Silver Lion for the best young artist ad Ali Cherrya Lebanese living in France, for his narratives inspired by the logic of progress and reason.
The career awards, already announced, went to the German Katharina Fritsch (here presented the opening sculpture, Elephantreplica of a taxidermized elephant) and Chilean style Cecilia Vicuawho lives in New York and is also a South American poetry translator and political activist.
Special mentions again to two women: the inuk artist Shuvinai Ashoona for his critique of colonialism and the American Lynn Hershman Leeson for the works cyborg. Also mentioned are the French pavilions, where Zineb Sedira, a Franco-Algerian, has also created a dance floor (motivation: For the stories of resistance even beyond the West), and the Uganda pavilion at Palazzo Fossati, with the Kampala artist Acaye Kerunen who sang a popular song on the paco.
I believe that the awards given reflect the orientation of the exhibition; I find it scandalous that it took Great Britain a hundred years to entrust its pavilion to a black artist, commented Cecilia Alemani. The Boyce and Simone Leigh awards finally put an end to a lack of recognition.
Is there too much forced ideology in this African supremacy at the Biennale? The autonomous jury – replies the president, Roberto Cicutto -. Great Britain and France are two great multi-ethnic nations, as is the United States. Perhaps this is why the artists they propose emerge in a review on metamorphosis and transformations. I believe that women have been more concerned with these issues and they emerge with non-Western origins.
April 23, 2022 (change April 23, 2022 | 20:10)
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