NOT ALL DOCUMENTS ARE RECORDS
2014-07-08The exhibition, curated by Lorenzo Fusi, looks at three key international visual art platforms through the lens of photography, moving between the past and future. The main theoretical question underpinning the project is: “Can photography be the site where the history of an exhibition is produced and still retain its independent artistic autonomy, thus overcoming pure documentation?”
The exhibition starts its journey from two of the most important art events in the world. Documenta in Kassel is a survey of modern and contemporary art, established in 1955 by Arnold Bode as a means for reconnecting Germany with the most recent developments in the arts after Nazi obscurantism and censorship. The prestigious Venice Biennale is the oldest exhibition of its kind, founded in 1895. These forums greatly contributed to and informed the so-called ‘biennial model’. International in relevance and ambition a biennial unfolds and manifests periodically with the aim of ‘photographing’ the status of the arts at a specific moment in time and anticipating the trends of the future. It is in this model that the Liverpool Biennial originates.
The show introduces the viewer to this format by presenting two seminal photographic series – Hans Haacke’s 1959 photographs of Documenta 2 and Ugo Mulas’ images of the 1968 Venice Biennale.
Exhibition runs through to October 19th, 2014
Open Eye Gallery
19 Mann Island
Liverpool Waterfront
Liverpool
L3 1BP
