The Lithuanian Pavilion was the winner of the Golden Lion prize at the 58th International Art Biennale in Venice 2019 with a project titled "Sun & Sea (Marina)." It was hosted in an indoor space were opera performers of various ages appeared in swim-suits as if on a sandy beach, laying on towels and relaxing in plastic chairs, reading magazines, browsing mobile phones, playing with toys. The audience stood on the first-floor observing the leisurely 'beach' crowd and listening to their ongoing singing which filled up the dark gallery space. Contrary to the more conventional art exhibition spaces, the Pavillion turned into an experiential and theatrical atmosphere which communicated and amplified the message: the image of a typical beach-scape, that could be found almost anywhere across the 'global sunbelt' formed a critique of a “[global] laziness that leads to the end of the world” using exhibition design and performance to speak in a non-didactic way about climatic change and other socio-ecological crises that are closely tied to the legacies of mass tourism and our globalized leisure culture.
Images: Petros Phokaides, July 2019
Comments