There is a lot of art in this Biennale
Perhaps this is why the visitor's impression is that, especially in the first and last scale, that is, in the micro and decidedly macro (where we are talking about the planet and the universe) there is much more art than architecture. You immediately notice walking in the first rooms of the Arsenale Corderie: where we find ante-litteram social distancing projects (Social Contracts by Allan Wexler), wearable religious architectures (Silk Road Works by Azra Aksamija), a canopy of sound clouds (Grove by Philip Beesley), a metaphoric landscape of the open city without barriers.
And a lot of science
Following this, science assumes an increasingly important role: with probiotic buildings, made with porous and organic walls (by David Benjamin of The Living), the landscape curated by a robotic gardener (Magic Queen by Daniela Mitterberger and Tiziano Derme by MAEIS), the architectural structures created by artificial intelligence on the basis of the neurological signals of our brain (Sense of Space by Refik Anadol with Gokhan S. Hotamishgil).
While technology emerges as the savior of nature
While in the macro area (the one in the central pavilion of the Giardini) it is the turn of technology, proposed in a decisive way by various projects as the only tool capable of stemming the environmental crisis that we have caused and continue to feed.
Just think of the proposal of the Self Assembly Lab of MIT (Building With Waves), which has devised a method to move the sand of the sea floor using the force of the waves to save territories that will soon be submerged, such as the Maldives. Or Satellights by Angelo Bucci, which explores the possibility of using spatial geostations as sources of artificial light to illuminate and supply electricity to entire cities.
Exiting as a different person
Despite the richness of the contents, therefore, the ongoing curatorship chosen by Sarkis, far from being professorial and boringly educational, allows the visitor to follow the unfolding of the discourse of this broad, multi-disciplinary and complex Biennale with great clarity. The result is that we happily feel different when we leave than when we enter: the yardstick that always works to understand the true value of an exhibition.