Biennale of Sydney #1: Black and white and red all over

The Biennale has opened to mixed acclaim.

"Boring as batshit"... "Rich, intense, mysterious"... "Dry and political"... "Confronting and provocative"... "Very monochrome" "Fun, fun, fun'... "Pretentious rubbish"... these are just some of the comments noted by LF at the vernissage and opening events, which seems to indicate that director Carolyn Christov-Bakargiev (CCB) must be doing something right.

It's too early for a comprehensive review of the work, but LF's initial impression is of a Biennale that is overwhelmingly European in its influences, despite the presence of many artists from all over the world. This is understandable given CCB's pedigree as a curator of 20th century conceptual art, especially the (initially Italian) Arte Povera movement, having written and edited the impressive Phaidon publication of that name.

The concept of Revolutions, although obviously operating on many levels, appears to be most firmly rooted in a fascination with the Russian-French-Italian-American 20th century intellectual left, and the social and artistic convulsions resulting from their brave new ways of thinking about the world. This is not a negative by the way. It's probably about time we had a rigorous and comprehensive survey of the ways in which these influences still permeate every aspect of western, and much non-western, contemporary art. This may be the most thorough survey of these influences since René Block's much-admired 'The Readymade Boomerang - Certain Relations in 20th Century Art' Biennale 0f 1990, nearly 20 years ago.

The admirable and very clever 'Online venue' (http://www.bos2008.com/revolutionsonline/) and catalogue seem to echo this idea - following of threads of influence, expressed via doodled scribbles and arrows, allowing one to explore linkages and correspondences across cultures and eras, in an open-ended way. A great piece of web design.

The catalogue also deserves a special mention - not least for having the courage to stick with monochrome throughout, featuring only drawings, many of them rough conceptual scribbles, from the participating artists. The difficulties of compiling these catalogues so far in advance is that much of the work is yet to be created or is site-specific, so too often we end up with a brochure of 'best-known-pieces' - one page per artist, without any context apart from some formidable up-front essays. CCB has stuck with the page (or 2) per artist, but created a rich textual accompaniment, with key writings by influential (mainly European mid 20th century, with a couple of Americans thrown in) 'revolutionary' thinkers. Marx, Lenin, Fanon, Debord, Benjamin, Breton, Lacan, Derrida... everyone's there. Once again this is not a negative, but reinforces the earlier comment about the European intellectual left underpinning of the Biennale's theme.

The inclusion of Australian (eg Taussig, Richard Bell) and American (eg Hoffmann, Torres-Garcia) writers, and of such diverse Australian contemporary artists as Shaun Gladwell, Tim (TV) Moore, Destiny Deacon and Mike Parr, plus artists from Asia, Latin America and Africa, does not really mitigate this impression, but rather enhances the perception that the art world globally has yet to emerge from the intellectual paradigm that began with, well... Duchamp. 'Le Mâitre' had to come up sooner or later. It's almost a banality these days to trace the demise of 'retinal' art to Marcel Duchamp, but it's nevertheless true. Probably. Maybe.

So... we have that upside-down bicycle wheel again, reminding us of the Biennale's theme, and signalling the birth of conceptual art. OK... got that. Spirals and rotating devices abound, especially at AGNSW. On entry, Michael Rakowitz's impressive 'White Man Got No Dreaming', a homage to Vladimir Tatlin's famous tower (of Babel) references, among other things, the impending 'redevelopment' of Redfern's Aboriginal neighbourhood. Bruce Nauman's neon sculpture of 1967 (made before everyone was doing them) 'The True Artist Helps the World by Revealing Mystic Truths' (shown above) is backed by Ross Gibson's 'conversation' booth. A study by the late, great Robert Smithson for his 'Spiral Jetty' nestles unobtrusively along the way, and it's good to see recreations of some of Len Lye's bizarre constructions, nicely juxtaposed with Jean Tinguely's infernal machines and Rebecca Horn's "Cutting through the past'. There are some pleasing in-jokes for those who know their 20th century art history.

Cocakatoo Island is the most interesting venue, and fabulously atmospheric - get there or be square - the ferries are free and frequent from Wharf 2/3 Walsh Bay. The artists party in the Turbine Hall (lit revolutionary red) on Wednesday night was quite a blast, and well-conceived as an event, although many artists expressed disappointment that the art was off limits for the night.

More to come, but in the meantime some impressions of opening events, photos ©Team Flaneur.