Title: Bienalsur 2019
Description: BIENALSUR started in 2015 with the Sur Global meetings, a thinking platform for contemporary art and culture. Over 100 venues around the world  hosted the second edition of BIENALSUR, the International Contemporary Art Biennial of South America, the greatest cultural event from Argentina to the world. Simultaneously, in 43 cities of a score of countries, there will be exhibitions with works by more than 400 artists and curators from all the continents. The second edition of BIENALSUR, the International Contemporary Art Biennial of South America, the greatest cultural event from Argentina to the world, was held between May and November 2019 with the participation of more than 400 artists. The exhibitions will be organized in 43 cities of a score of countries at more than one hundred venues, including museums, cultural centres, institutions and iconic urban areas, under the premise of bringing a diversity of contemporary artistic manifestations to the public free of charge. In the BIENALSUR 2019 venues, both collective and solo exhibitions will showcase the creations of a list of notable artists, including Michelangelo Pistoletto (Italy), Bill Viola, Martha Rosler, David Lynch (United States), Reza Aramesh (Iran), Christian Boltanski, Agnès Varda, Sophie Calle, Annette Messager (France), Cildo Meireles, Beatriz Milhazes, Waltércio Caldas, Rosângela Rennó (Brazil), Joël Andrianomearisoa (Madagascar), Teresa Margolles, Betsabeé Romero (Mexico), Edith Dekyndt, Marcel Odenbach (Germany), Makoto Azuma, Katsuhiko Hibino (Japan), Voluspa Jarpa (Chile), Paul Rosero Contreras, José Alejandro Restrepo (Colombia), Grupo Etcétera (Argentina/Chile), Pablo Reinoso, Edgardo Rudnitzky, Eduardo Basualdo, Jorge Macchi, Marie Orensanz, Leandro Erlich, Guillermo Kuitca, Elda Cerrato and Eduardo Stupía (Argentina), among many others. In accordance with its unique and singular dynamics of building a new geography, not based on territorial borders, but on a global and multicultural community of solidarity, the biennial will be formally opened on May 20th in Tierra del Fuego, a symbolic way to begin its journey in the southernmost point of the continent. At the Museo Fueguino de Arte, Rio Grande, the exhibition "Landscapes between Landscapes" will present works by Angelika Markul (POL/FRA), Esteban Álvarez (ARG), Lia Chaia (BRA), Gabriela Golder (ARG), Matilde Marín (ARG), Dora Longo Bahía (BRA), Gustavo Groh (ARG), Carla Zaccagnini (ARG/BRA), Graciela Taquini (ARG) and Rosângela Rennó (BRA). The artistic itinerary will then continue with successive openings: on May 25th in the province of Tucumán, on June 5th and 6th in Rosario, on June 8th in Lens and Crans-Montana, Switzerland, on June 12th in the province of Córdoba. The week of June 24th June 29th will be frantically busy with the openings of numerous spaces in the city of Buenos Aires. The Biennial will then reach out to the rest of world to be present in countries such as Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Cuba, Ecuador, Mexico, Paraguay, Peru, Uruguay, Benin, Spain, France, Italy, Morocco and Japan, among others. The must-sees at BIENALSUR 2019 Pistoletto Circuit: such is the name given to the artistic itinerary of spaces intervened by the renowned Italian creator and representative of Arte Povera, which will begin in the gardens of Italian Embassy in Argentina, and will then continue in the National Museum of Decorative Art, and later in the National Museum of Fine Arts after visiting the KM 0, where there will be interventions related to the topic of migrations and a number of site-specific installations. The circuit will finish in the La Boca district, with activities connected with the Terzo Paradiso project, which Michelangelo Pistoletto has been conducting in various cities worldwide in collaboration with the Benito Quinquela Martín Museum. On June 21st, American Bill Viola, one of the most influential figures of contemporary video art will present the exhibition Worksʺ, curated by Brazilian Marcello Dantas, at the Franklin Rawson Provincial Museum of Fine Arts of San Juan (KM 1,133). This superstar of video art will present his fascinating pieces, in which he addresses some of the tropes that permeate all his projects, such as the human condition, birth, and death.Works from the collection of the Cartier Foundation from Paris will be showcased in the Rubén Darío Park (KM 3.2) of the city of Buenos Aires in Draw me a Flagʺ, a project in the public space conceived by French artist Christian Boltanski. It gathers 80 flags with high visual impact designed by artists from several latitudes such as Guillermo Kuitca (ARG), David Lynch (USA), Beatriz Milhazes (BRA), Agnès Varda (FRA) and others included in the Cartier collection.Pieces by artists such as Sophie Calle (France) and Harum Farocki (Germany) will be displayed in the show Control! (variations on biopolitics)ʺ at the ICNPN venue of Lima (Peru) and at the Universidad de las Américas Puebla, México (KM 7,286).The district of Crans Montana in Valais, Switzerland (KM 11,930) will host a large installation in the public space as of June 8th with works by Leandro Erlich (ARG/DEU), Marie Orensanz (ARG/FRA) and Pablo Reinoso (ARG/FRA). In turn, the Opale Foundation in Lens will present "Kulata Tjuta" by a collective of Australian artists invited for this project.France will be the venue of an important set of BIENALSUR 2019 projects, including the programme Grata Personaʺ of the MAC VAL (Val de Marne, Paris), the residency of Hugo Aveta, and a series of projects at the FRACS of Toulouse and Marseille, among other locations. The Maison de l'Amérique latine will feature From the Other Sideʺ, a project by Pablo Reinoso. Additionally, the sound installation "Ici et maintenant" will be featured at the chapel of the Fernández Blanco Museum of Buenos Aires, while a chapel of La Rochelle will be simultaneously transformed into a contemporary art space.On August 15th, the MMAM  Municipal Museum of Modern Art of Cuenca-, Ecuador (KM 5,338) will present the exhibition Machinations, contemporary dialoguesʺ with works by artists Teresa Margolles (MEX), Marcelo Brodsky (ARG), Alexander Apóstol (VEN), Julio Le Parc (ARG), Liliana Porter (ARG), Waltércio Caldas (BRA), León Ferrari (ARG), José Alejandro Restrepo (COL) and others.The MUNTREF Centre for Art and Nature  Eco Park Venue (KM 5.5) - of Buenos Aires will host the exhibition In Bloomʺ by Japanese artist Azuma Makoto, a pioneer of flower art, who follows the ikebana tradition. The artist will present a record of his botanical sculptures, a series of works made with flowers and plants of striking beauty on the Okinawa Island and a production carried out on the salt flats of the Province of Jujuy for BIENALSUR 2019.Spain will be among the highlights of the biennial cartography, as this edition includes prominent venues in different cities: the Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía of Madrid, which will present Keep Reading, Giving Riseʺ by Spanish artist Rogelio López Cuenca; the Es Baluard Museu dœArt Modern of the Palma de Mallorca Island, which will present a group exhibition with works by Spanish artists; and the Centre d'Art Maristany of Sant Cugat and the Virreina Centre de la Imatge, in Barcelona.Martha Rosler, in Buenos Aires and Santiago de Chile. The project Libraryʺ by the distinguished American artist, activist and feminist offers an unprecedented exhibition proposal: borrowing her personal library temporarily and opening it to the public in the form of a reading room. This exceptional montage suggests multiple meanings and possibilities to get acquainted, from a new perspective, with an artist whose work is based on a critical exploration of womenœs problems at the Muntref- Contemporary Art Centre  Old Immigrantsœ Hotel Venue (KM 0). At the same time, Rosler will be present at the Contemporary Art Museum of the Universidad de Chile with a retrospective show focused on aesthetic-political issues and especially on her work in Chile during Pinochetœs dictatorship.
Subjects: Art, Exhibitions, Latin American Art, Modern Art
Places: Latin America
Time periods: 21st century