Venice Biennale Remainders: Allora and Calzadilla Aren’t So Bad | Christian Marclay’s “Timeless” Clock | Scads of Flickr Photos

The weakest work of the Allora Calzadilla exhibition: this seven-and-a-half-foot replica of the Statue of Freedom inside a tanning booth. Image via: NYMagazine. Photo: Filippo Monteforte

Despite the inevitable buzz, the tank and organ weren't even the best works in their own pavilion – that honor goes to a series of gymnast routines on airline seats, performed roughly every fifteen minutes, that used Olympic athletes as both appendage and counterpoint to the sculptural qualities of business class. The best moments came when the choreography mimicked the form of the seat itself – there's a simple enjoyment of the human body here that escapes the heavy-handed political worries of other works at the pavilion.

It’s worth mentioning here that the routines clearly needed more time to develop. Used to performing to giant audiences on stage, many of the movements designed to be seen at a distance remained part of the choreography. The rooms in the pavilion, though, were very small and packed with people, so often those gestures were too grand to make the intended impact. Having interviewed some of the athletes involved, it seems like this was simply a mistake – a matter of not preparing their routines with the space in mind. Given how much of the piece worked, though, it was easy to look past that. I hope the couple has a chance to develop the work in the future.

Elad Lassry, "Untitled (Ghost)", 2011. 35 mm color film (1.33 full frame), 18', silent.

Those looking to see the Biennale through the lens of a shitty photographer are in luck. I’ve uploaded and organized several hundred photographs I took while in Venice to flickr. Many of them are now captioned, as well, though that process is ongoing. The Art Fag City flickr steam is an image database I use for research when reviewing shows, but its there for readers as well. There’re only three years of archives so far, but I find it invaluable.

Christian Marclay's The Clock

From Dan Cameron’s Facebook page: It’s beginning to seem like Christian Marclay’s The Clock (which I caught about 90 minutes of today and hope to stay at all night this week) is the definitive artwork of our time. Anybody feel differently (or the same)?

Cue the Facebook choir. Everyone loves this work.

I like it too, but am I the only one who thinks this piece will look very dated in just a few short years? Producing a project like this right now is very hard, but I see a future in which some high school kid with loads of free time does better. In any case, something about the words “definitive artwork of our time” makes me cringe. Call me old fashioned but I’d like the piece to exist for at least a few years before we start adding it to all our textbooks.

Tagged as: Adrian Searle, Allora and Calzadilla, Christian Marclay, christian Marclay's The Clock, Dan Cameron, Elad Lassry, flickr, jerry saltz, The Clock, The Daily, Venice Biennale