Life Imitates Art at La Biennale di Venezia

I'm thinking of writing a letter to the organizers of La Biennale di Venezia to ask them to be a bit more careful when they select the title of the 2021 event. This international art exhibition is held in Venice every year and the shows alternate between Biennale Arte and Biennale Architettura.  Art and architecture lovers from around the world are usually invited to visit the exhibition from May to November, but due to the coronavirus, this year's kickoff will be three months later and the event three months shorter.

Window to the World. Step up to the window for a more intimate view of the beach forest.

 Unlike several friends, I actually enjoy the Biennale.  I don't understand much about modern art and I'm not sure anyone else does, but I'm not willing to give up. 

I'm sad to say that I don't remember the name or country of one of my favorite installations.  Come with me into this huge, empty warehouse. (Be patient, read slowly and follow along.) It's square with black walls and has high ceilings.  Concentrate. Three feet in from the four walls they've installed a chain link fence. And three feet from the ceiling they've topped that chain link fence with a chain link ceiling. Now we have a giant black room, with a giant chain link fence room inside it.  The chain link fence room has a small opening and you can enter.  Go in. You're still in the same big, black room where you can see its walls and ceiling, but being just one step inside the chain link fence room, you're suddenly in a different place. I kept going in and out and I kept feeling the difference.  

I didn't have to read an explanation of the chain link fence installation to feel it.  And maybe I didn't feel what I was supposed to feel, but I felt something.  And that's why I go back to the Biennale year after year.  I like to feel something.

Le Boe. (The Buoys) All materials donated by the Adriatic.

I've attached photos of a few of my own creations.  They may not be worthy of a place at the Biennale, but more than one person has felt something, and in the end isn't that what art is all about?

In 2019 Biennale Arte was titled May You Live In Interesting Times. At the end of 2019 the entire city of Venice and my nearby island flooded.  And two months later the coronavirus arrived.  Are those considered interesting times?

The title of Biennale Architettura 2020 is How Will We Live Together? These days in Italy we're doing everything we can to live apart. So if the coronavirus ever goes away, the question could very well be "how do we live together?" 

Look through the window from the forest and there's nothing  but sea.

In the Decay of Lying Oscar Wilde wrote, "Life imitates art."  If the curators of the Biennale support this thought, they should have been more careful naming their shows.  I'd like to submit an idea for the title of Biennale Arte 2021.  How 'bout It's a Wonderful Life?  What could go wrong with that?