The 61st Venice Biennale has opened with a bang, featuring participants from 99 countries and a host of wild, unforgettable moments. The Guardian's David Levene braved two-headed worms, Pussy Riot protests, and a tank of urine to bring this photographic extravaganza from the celebrated arts festival.
Highlights from the Giardini
At the Giardini site, Ukrainian artist Zhanna Kadyrova's 'Security Guarantees' greets visitors with an 'Origami Deer'—a concrete sculpture evacuated from Pokrovsk in Ukraine's Donetsk Oblast in 2024, before Russian forces took control. The Biennale runs until 22 November.
Inside the Egyptian pavilion, visitors explore the 'Silence Pavilion: Between the Tangible and the Intangible', an installation by Armen Agop that encourages touch and smell as well as sight.
The Polish pavilion features 'Liquid Tongues', a film by Bogna Burska and deaf artist Daniel Kotowski, showing a choir of hearing and deaf singers performing in a Warsaw swimming pool. Outside, a seagull nesting near the pavilion became a minor celebrity, with visitors flocking to photograph her.
Off-Site Wonders
The Holy See pavilion at Giardino Mistico offers an immersive sound installation curated by Hans Ulrich Obrist and Ben Vickers, featuring works by Patti Smith, Jim Jarmusch, Brian Eno, and FKA twigs. Visitors wear headphones as they advance through the gardens.
At the Japanese pavilion, Ei Arakawa-Nash's 'Grass Babies, Moon Babies' invites visitors to carry baby dolls and change their nappies to reveal QR codes generating 'diaper poems'.
The Austrian pavilion's 'Seaworld Venice' by Florentina Holzinger features naked performers, a giant bell rung by a human dangling upside down, and a jetski racing around a tank of water, drenching front-row audience members. The installation presents a dystopian vision of flooding and 'civilisation dissolved in piss'.
Notable Exhibitions
At the Palazzo Diedo, Holly Herndon presents 'Strange Rules' alongside biology professor Michael Levin, who creates worms with two heads using bio-electricity. Anish Kapoor's Palazzo Manfrin displays 'At the Edge of the World', a giant bell-like form with a deadening black interior.
Lubaina Himid and Magda Stawarska collaborate at the British pavilion, while Lydia Ourahmane's 'Rock Soup' at the Nicoletta Fiorucci Foundation features a boiling broth as 'sculptural soup'.
Gabrielle Goliath's 'Elegy' was shown offsite after being prevented from representing South Africa. Other highlights include Miet Warlop's 'IT NEVER SSST' for Belgium, Andreas Angelidakis' 'Escape Room' for Greece, and Oriol Vilanova's 'Los Restos' for Spain, featuring thousands of postcards.
More Biennale Moments
Arthur Jafa's video work at Fondazione Prada, Alma Allen's 'Not Yet Titled' at the US pavilion, and Kaloki Nyamai's large-scale installations at the Arsenale are among the must-see exhibits. Ukrainian artist Daria Koltsova displayed military uniforms donated by Ukrainian soldiers, hung like laundry.
Members of Pussy Riot protested outside the Russia pavilion against the country's inclusion in the Biennale. All text and photography by David Levene, with special thanks to photographic assistant Flora Luna.
