Venice Biennale and its cities

Abstract

The Venice Biennale is the first exhibition of contemporary art that takes place every two years and the only one that still preserves the classic division into national pavilions. Antoni Mundatas with On Translation: I Giardini, a project presented in 2005, not only criticizes this division, judging it obsolete, but also defines the international exhibition as a “microcity where history is reflected in the details of its planning”. The issues analyzed by Muntadas allow to study this microcity (the original core of the Giardini di Castello and its urban development that reached out to the Sestieri and the isles of the lagoon) and demonstrate how the Biennale is a city in itself, whose urban evolution is linked to a precise canon – that of medieval cities and, afterwards, of the modern city.