19th Architecture Biennale in Venice

It was in 1895, when the former mayor together with some artist friends organized for the first time an international art exhibition in the park, which was still known as the “Napoleonic Gardens”. Over 200.000 people came to see the exhibition. Thus began the success story of the Biennale, which has long been divided into various branches, including not only art and architecture, but also dance, music and theater, as well as the annual film festival held on the Lido. The Biennale has grown into a huge organization that shapes the cultural – and economic – life of the city. Since a long time, the park, which has been renamed the Biennale Gardens many years ago, has not been able to accommodate all the participating nations (last year there were 88). The first national pavilions were built at the beginning of the 20th century and today the park is home to gems by many world-famous architects, so that a tour of the exhibition is always also a short architectural journey around the world.

Other nations have their places in the Arsenal, which has been added since the first Architecture Biennale in 1980 under the direction of Paolo Portoghesi, or spread throughout the city, in a palazzo, former shipyard, private apartment or courtyard, allowing access to otherwise well-sealed places.

“Intelligens. Natural. Artificial. Collective.” is the title of this year’s 19th Architecture Biennale. After the exclusive vernissage hustle and bustle, it will open its doors to the general public from May 10th to November 23rd. The curator is the Italian architect, urban planner and architectural theorist Carlo Ratti, who has become known for his urban visions of the future shaped by digitalization, teaches at the Milan Polytechnic and MIT and is now responsible for the world’s largest architecture exhibition. The focus is on architecture and urban spaces that are able to respond dynamically to the needs of people and environment.

He himself coined the term “senseable city”. In this city, the enormous amounts of data produced daily by its residents are not only used to optimize urban infrastructures, but also interpret the behavior in urban spaces and thus contribute to the formulation of new design paradigms. The Biennale exhibitions of the recent years have shown that an exhibition of this kind is no longer about representing the latest national achievements, but is rather understood as an experimental space.

We can assume that the curator follows this approach, as Ratti says in his call: “To face a burning world, architecture must harness all the intelligence around us.”

Text by: Anabel Gelhaar, MOVEnice