An introductory note by the Venice Biennale exhibition director Bice Curiger

While the last Biennale ‘Making Worlds’ highlighted constructive creativity, ILLUMInations will focus on the ‘light’ of the illuminating experience, on the epiphanies that come with inter-communicative, intellectual comprehension. The Age of Enlightenment also resonates in ILLUMInations, testifying to the enduring vibrancy of its legacy.

Despite the fact that, in recent years, the idealization of enlightened reason and a specific brand of European western scholarly practice have come under fire, we cannot help respecting and even defending their value particularly in regard to the debate on human rights.

In organizing a Biennale today, it is vital to bear in mind that contemporary art is characterized by collective tendencies and fragmented identities, by temporary alliances and objects in which the transitory is inscribed – even if they are cast in bronze. The expansive drive that has propelled art since the 1960s has turned inwards. Art no longer cultivates the pathos of anti-art. Perception is now focused on the foundations of culture and art in order to illuminate semantic conventions from within.

On one hand, the artifact has given way to an emphasis on process, while, on the other, the revival of “classical” genres like sculpture, painting, photography and film is motivated by an interest in dissecting their codes and activating their dormant potential. These concerns go hand-in-hand with another aspect that is of great relevance today: art strongly engages and commits its viewers.

The 54th International Art Exhibition should emerge and develop in a process of inspired exchange and mutual stimulation with the artists. We asked four artists (Monika Sosnowska, Franz West, Song Dong and Oscar Tuazon) to create so called ‘parapavilions’ to host other artists’ works.

Although ILLUMInations is primarily focused on the presentation of younger artists, an older generation will also be represented, whose vibrant, highly contemporary work deserves to be showcased, for instance Llyn Foulkes (1934), Luigi Ghirri (1943-1992), Jack Goldstein (1945-2003), Gedewon (1939-1995) and Jeanne Natalie Wintsch (1871-1944).

Art is a highly self-reflexive terrain that cultivates a lucid take on the outside world. The communicative aspect is crucial to the ideas underlying ILLUMInazioni, as demonstrated in art that often declares and seeks closeness to the vibrancy of life. This is more important now than ever before, in an age when our sense of reality is profoundly challenged by virtual and simulated worlds.