Friday 29 July 2022

Venice Biennale 2022: Part three

Children play leap frog and a broken stick becomes a gun: Francis Alÿs notebook page

Francis Alÿs had a wonderful exhibition in the Belgian pavilion; 'The Nature of the Game', featuring a group of short films as well as a selection of paintings.

From: 'The Nature of the Game'

Since 1999 Alÿs has documented children at play in public spaces across the globe. Filmed between 2017 and 2022 in Hong Kong, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Belgium, and Mexico, among others, Alÿs presents us with a life affirming set of video projections that highlight the central role of play in all our lives. 

He follows children at play with a camera and as he does so we are brought into the various worlds that have been developed by children as they invent their way through life. Many of these games involve the re-appropriation of objects; plastic bottles become the objects of kicking games, a large tyre becomes an exciting means of rolling downhill, sticks become guns within a game about territory and cracks become something to avoid in a stepping stone game. The invention we associate with art is seen to be something that is natural to all human beings.

Although this was a video dominated exhibition, I have always thought of Alÿs as an artist who thinks through drawing and this exhibition in many ways confirmed this. Alongside the exhibition was a publication devoted to his notebook thinking. As soon as I began to look through this I realised that it was a perfect illustration of an artist thinking out loud. His pages of tiny images interlaced with text revealing ideas being first of all seen out in the world and then developed as artworks. 



Some pages were developed into worked through imagery. Throughout the notebook there was a dialogue between play and war; the dividing line between the two at times becoming blurred. 

This boy with a rifle stares out at the sea, you sense the sea's mesmeric effect on him and his easy carrying of a weapon of death. A boy caught between fantasy and reality. 

A tiny sketch made of boys playing in the ruins of war

An idea begins about two boys playing

This is a working notebook, at times it will get wet.

Another game: this time cat's cradle is the focus


Out of this small drawing the idea for a film about a girl skipping along the streets avoiding cracks will emerge. 

A still from 'The Nature of the Game'

The fact that a coffee cup was put down on the page and left its telltale mark, indicating that he is thinking not making nice drawings.



More Francis Alÿs notebook pages.

The dividing line between children and play and peoples at war is Alÿs shows us very fine. In the activities of play there lie the germs of war. I have for a long time admired Alÿs, he often seems to put his finger on our human condition, but in a way that feels life affirming, rather than weighing us down in doom and gloom and trying to tell us what's wrong. 
Watching the children at their various games was a joy, it reminded me of how as children we have a wonderful spirit and the potential to collaborate on the most fantastic ventures. Unfortunately, many of our dreams are disabled by reality, but that doesn't mean we have to stop dreaming. In a time when so many events seem to forecast disaster, this work was a reminder to be positive and to look to possible futures where the best of our species comes to the fore. 

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