VENICE BIENNIAL 2024: THE WINNERS OF THE GOLDEN LION

The Venice Biennale 2024 “Strangers Everywhere – Foreigners Everywhere“, edited by Adriano Pedrosa, it has already broken all visitor records in the first days of opening.

Focused on the definition of “foreigner“, This year's Biennale wants to give space to those artists who usually struggle to appear on international stages, like those belonging to Indigenous populations and Queer people. Maximum visibility, Furthermore, is given to burning issues such as homophobia and colonialism.

Not by chance, the winners of the two Golden Lions (to the best national pavilion and the best independent artist) were awarded to a group of Indigenous artists from respectively Australia and New Zealand. Let's find out who it is!

Archie Moore: his Australian Pavilion wins the Golden Lion at the Biennial

It was an Indigenous artist who won the Golden Lion at the Venice Biennale 2024 for the best national participation. Sto parlando dell’artista Aborigeno Archie Moore and his solo show at the Australia pavilion, edited by Ellie Buttrose, which earned him the most important prize.

Moore's work, titled Kith and Kin, Talks about 65.000 years of Aboriginal history and of nonlinear concepts of time and place. On the black walls of the pavilion, l’artista ha meticolosamente disegnato col gesso l’genealogical tree of his family. It encompasses thousands of generations that preceded us, per poi riversarsi sul soffitto dove i nomi diventano una sorta di stelle in un cielo notturno infinito – richiamando al concetto di Dreamtime così caro agli Australian Aborigines.

Under this intricate set of lives there is a white table on which hundreds of piled up rest documents certifying the deaths of Aboriginal people. Among these are the reports drawn up by the Court of 557 Aboriginal people who have died in custody and in prisons since the royal commission of 1991 he issued 339 recommendations designed to prevent these types of tragedies.

Nonostante oggi la frase ‘kith and kin’ significhi semplicemente ‘amici e famiglia’. in the English of 1300 kith significava “la propria terra natale”, While kin “membri della famiglia”. Many Australian Aborigines they consider their land, who call Country, and other living things as part of their kinship systems: the earth itself can be a mentor, a teacher, a parent. The sense of belonging and the connection with one's land is all-encompassing, profondamente radicato nella vita di una persona–dalla nascita alla morte, and is common to many other Indigenous cultures.

And the first time Australia wins the Golden Lion in 60 years of the Biennial, and the fact that he won it Aboriginal artist who with his works denounces the impact of colonialism is absolutely significant.

Mataho Collective: 4 Māori artists win the Golden Lion at the Venice Biennale

A group of Indigenous artists won the Golden Lion at the Venice Biennale 2024 for the best artist participating in the international exhibition Strangers Everywhere – Foreigners Everywhere. I mean Mataho Collective, a collective born in 2012 is composed by 4 Māori artist who produce large-scale installations and whose artistic practice is closely linked to the traditions of their people.

Legs And the monumental installation of the New Zealand collective that opens the International Exhibition Strangers Everywhere at the Arsenal. The work, which recalls them traditional mats just call gay, it is made with a wonderful weave of polyester bands stretched through tie rods arranged along the walls. The luce it has a starring role because it filters through the thick polyester bands and projects onto the floor, on the walls and on the visitors a sort of large shady mat – che avvolge tutto e tutti come un abbraccio materno.

Not by chance, the mats gay they are used by Māori women predominantly during the part. The work of Mataaho Collective is a reminder of matrilineal tradition of fabrics, and can be interpreted both as a cosmology-a sort of starry sky, both as a refuge, a maternal womb in which to feel safe.

The victory of Mataaho Collective, together with that of the Pavilion Australia with Archie Moore's solo show, highlight a growing interest towards a type of art that, on one side, recalls the most ancient traditions of the gods Indigenous peoples e, on the other, denounces a colonial past made up of centuries of abuse and denial of one's own cultures.

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