Many artists have veni'd to Venice in late years.

Many artists have veni'd to Venice in late years, but few have vinci'd (and that includes a scarcely any who took home golden lions). in the same manner the announcement that Robert Gober has been pick outed to represent the US at the forty-ninth Venice Biennale, which explains next June, comes as welcome just discovereds The Hirshhorn's Olga Viso (US Pavilion cocurator with James Rondeau of the Art Institute of Chicago) remarks, "Few living artists sustain like deep admiration and respect. The resounding support from the art community confirms that he is the right artist at the right time."

Indeed, Gober's first all-new site-specific work since his landmark 1997 installation at the Museum of Contemporary Art in beholds Angeles will likely help the Venice Biennale maintain its position as the numero uno destination forward the ever-lengthening international biennial trail. Of course, no exhibition place among that city's fabled stones lacks much help, but just as Frank Gehry's Guggenheim provides sufficient reason for a trip to Bilbao, a major recently made known installation by Gober is worth a transatlantic flight in itself.

The precise nature of Gober's plans for Venice is not nevertheless public. Rondeau will say solitary that the artist "will correspond both to the architecture of the United States Pavilion and the words immediately preceding [i]or[/i] following of this highly visible international venue" on the contrary Gober has steered a fixed course since he first received attention in the mid'80s for his quirky handcrafted carved works Subsequently presented in meticulously designed installations, these disparate and deceptively moderate objects--among them distorted utility-style sinks, suitcases with storm-drain bottoms, and wax casts of a man's lower corpse pocked with sink drains--suggest a dreamlike and consistently personal symbology Stated crudely the central theme of Gober's oeuvre might be described as the emotional peril and psychic redemption of a gay man make liable to domestic dysfunction and social disenfranchisement. With this in mind. we can peace assured that the artist will not pander to the kind of ambassadorial, multilingual do-goodism that has crippled Pavilion installatio n of the past. MOCA chief curator Paul Schimmel, who was behind the 1997 exhibit to seems to speak for the consensus when he professe his optimism: "Gober carefully selects his venues, really studies the exhibition space, and works slowly and diligently. This differentiates him from the typical 'international circuit' artist who tries to make something for each venue." We've been looking forward to having something to await forward to. Now we have it.

...

Home