I was texting a museum director friend in Asia recently. We were discussing whether a trip to this year’s “artworld Olympics”, the Venice Biennale, justified the carbon release.
I felt ambivalent. The main exhibition is curated by Koyo Kouoh, whose 2016 edition of Ireland’s Biennale, EVA International, on the 1916 Easter Rising centennial I had admired. Kouoh died of cancer earlier this year. Her posthumously realised Venice Biennale, titled In Minor Keys, seemed a final opportunity to appreciate the subtle, intelligent work of Africa’s leading curator.
Against the lure of Kouoh’s exhibition, though, was a queasy realisation that the Biennale seemed to be ideologically backsliding. Russia and Israel, both accused of war crimes, were controversially participating.
