Secret Power is Simon Denny’s project for New Zealand Pavilion at the 56th International Art Exhibition. The exhibition will address the intersection of knowledge and geography in the post-Snowden world. It will investigate new and obsolete languages for describing geo-political space, focusing on the roles played by technology and design.
The 2015 New Zealand Pavilion will be split across two sites: one modern, at the edge of Venice and one historical, at its heart.Simon Denny will be the first Biennale artist to use the terminal at Marco Polo Airport, designed by architect Gian Paolo Mar. Extending through the arrivals lounge, Denny’s installation will operate between national borders, mixing the languages of commercial display, contemporary airport interior design, and historical representations of the value of knowledge.
The other half of the New Zealand pavilion will be the Marciana Library in Piazza San Marco, designed by Jacopo Sansovino during the Renaissance. It houses historical maps and globes, including Fra Mauro’s early world map. Here, Denny’s installation will draw analogies between this spectacular but obsolete map and the way the world is mapped and managed today.
‘‘We’re at an unprecedented moment, where technology plays a really large part in our lives. And it becomes increasingly visible how much power is concentrated in the hands of those who define that technology… technology, now particularly, seems to be kind of a good window to look at where the concentration of power and wealth is in the world.’’ Simon Denny
New Zealand Pavilion
Secret Power
9 May – 22 November 2015
Biblioteca Nazionale Marciana (Saint Mark’s Square)
Marco Polo Airport
Artist: Simon Denny
Curator: Robert Leonard
Commissioner: Heather Galbraith, Head, Whiti o Rehua School of Art, Massey University, Wellington for Creative New Zealand, Arts Council of New Zealand
www.nzatvenice.com
Image Credits:
– Ich will umsteigen. Wie geht Das? (Samsung), 2013.
– The Personal Effects of Kim Dotcom, 2013. Installation view, MUMOK, Vienna
– Remote Control, 2012. Installation view, Institute of Contemporary Arts, London. Photo by Stephen White, Victoria Erdelevskaya
– Freemium Crushed TV: Candy Crush Saga, 2013. Photo by Samuel Ash
– Analogue Broadcasting Hardware Compression, 2013. Installation view, Venice Biennale 2013. Photo by Contemporary Art Daily
