Page 55 - La Biennale di Venezia issue of World of Art Magazine

SLOVENIA
Here We Go Again...SYSTEM 317
THE X-43A/PEGASUS COMBINATION Commissioner: Titi Nxumalo, Console Generale.
DROPPED INTO THE PACIFIC OCEAN Curators: Nkule Mabaso, Nomusa Makhubu.
AFTER LOSING CONTROL EARLY IN THE
FIRST FREE-FLIGHT ATTEMPT. ARTIST Exhibitors: Dineo Seshee Bopape, Tracey Rose, Mawande Ka Zenzile.
RESEARCH WORKING MATERIAL. Venue: Arsenale
PHOTO: JIM ROSS

Marko Peljhan is an artist and researcher working in and
between art, technology and science. His projects, initiatives,
and collaborations span a vast area ranging from ecology and
social reflection to tactical media, technology, space exploration
and geopolitics. In his poetic and strategic actions he frequently
employs materials and methods that serve to confront systems
of governance and the strategies they employ. His work revolves
around the technological developments in communication,
transport, and surveillance, and the highly complex systems of
political, economic, and military power driving such developments
and employing them in administration, control, production or
military applications. Peljhan’s art has evolved into a process
involving a cartography of the invisible and the overlooked, and
an analysis of the role of technology in society, particularly as it
relates to power structures. It opens up a process of reflection
on the possibilities of a different, creative and resistant use of
technology and proposes the creation of socially useful models of
resistant behaviors in the contemporary social system. The artist
brings a great deal of historical awareness to his work, remaining
at the same time loyal to values integral to notions of artistic and
technological avant-gardism. (excerpt)
SYRIAN ARAB REPUBLIC

Syrian Civilization is still alive
PRIMO VANADIA- Commissioner/Curator: Emad Kashout.
HORIZON FOR ROSALY Exhibitors: Abdalah Abouassali, Giacomo Braglia, Ibrahim Al Hamid, Chen Huasha, Saed Salloum, Xie Tian, Saad Yagan,
Primo Vanadia, Giuseppe Biasio.
Venue: Isola di San Servolo, Chiesetta della Misericordia, Campo dell’Abbazia, Cannaregio

Syria played a crucial role in the foundation of both Christian
and Islamic art. Due to its geographical position, Syria was
often invaded, and the whole region was subject to unrest.
Consequently, the natural development of arts was interrupted,
and they almost disappeared until the beginning of the last
century. The flourishing of European art had an impact on the
earliest stage of Syrian artistic trends, namely realism and
documentary impressionism.

Then, in the 1930s and 1940s, thanks to the introduction of art in
the educational curriculum, French teachers in schools, and the
travels of Syrian artists to Europe, an exceptional interest in the
arts arose in Syria. The multiplicity of art trends was apparent
in what came next, that is, the pioneering stage of Syrian visual
arts, which can be described as the stage of entrepreneurship,
or of modernity. These trends illustrate the intellectual formation
of Syrian Arab Republic Pavilion at the 58th International Art
Exhibition - La Biennale di Venezia Syrian Civilization is Still Alive
the artists from the early phase of Syrian visual arts, and their
historical relevance is also highlighted. (excerpt)

WORLD of ART 55