The 32nd Bienal de São Paulo, titled “Incerteza viva” (Live Uncertainty) means to reflect on the current conditions of life and the strategies offered by contemporary art to harbor or inhabit uncertainty. The exhibition, curated by Jochen Volz with Gabi Ngcobo, Júlia Rebouças, Lars Bang Larsen, and Sofía Olascoaga will be held from September 10 to December 12, 2016 at the Ciccillo Matarazzo Pavilion, featuring approximately 90 artists and collectives, 54 of which are announced here.
Below you can see the preliminary list of artists that will tackle these subjects, which features a diverse mix of established figures and rising stars from all over the world including Öyvind Fahlström, Francis Alÿs,Pierre Huyghe, Hito Steyerl, Henrik Olesen, Erika Verzutti, Em’kal Eyongakpa, Koo Jeong A, Park McArthur, Rachel Rose, and Pilar Quinteros:
Artist List
Alia Farid
Born in Kuwait, 1985. Lives and works in Kuwait.
Anawana Haloba
Born in Livingstone, Zambia, 1978. Lives and works in Oslo, Norway.
Bárbara Wagner
Born in Brasilia, Brazil, 1980. Lives and works in Recife, Brazil.
Bené Fonteles
Born in Bragança, Pará, Brazil, 1953. Lives and works in Brasilia, Brazil.
Carla Filipe
Born in Aveiro, Portugal, 1973. Lives and works in Porto, Portugal.
Carolina Caycedo
Born in London, United Kingdom, 1978. Lives and works in La Jagua, Colombia and Los Angeles, USA.
Cecilia Bengolea
Born in Buenos Aires, Argentina, 1984. Lives and works in Paris, France.
Charlotte Johannesson
Born in Malmö, Sweden, 1943. Lives and works in Skanör, Sweden.
Cristiano Lenhardt
Born in Itaara, Brazil, 1975. Lives and works in Recife, Brazil.
Dineo Seshee Bopape
Born in Polokwane, South Africa, 1981. Lives and works in Johannesburg, South Africa.
Ebony G. Patterson
Born in Kingston, Jamaica, 1981. Lives and works in Kingston, Jamaica and USA.
Eduardo Navarro
Born in Buenos Aires, Argentina, 1979. Lives and works in Buenos Aires, Argentina.
Em’kal Eyongakpa
Born in Eshobi, Cameroon, 1981. Lives and works in Cameroon and Amsterdam, The Netherlands.
Erika Verzutti
Born in São Paulo, Brazil, 1971. Lives and works in São Paulo, Brazil.
Felipe Mujica
Born in Santiago, Chile, 1974. Lives and works in New York, USA.
Francis Alÿs
Born in Antwerp, Belgium, 1959. Lives and works in Mexico City, Mexico.
Gabriel Abrantes
Born in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, USA, 1984. Lives and works in Lisbon, Portugal.
Gilvan Samico
Born in Recife, Brasil, 1928 – Recife, Brazil, 2013.
Güneş Terkol
Born in Ankara, Turkey, 1981. Lives and works in Istanbul, Turkey.
Heather Phillipson
Born in London, United Kingdom, 1978, Lives and works in London, United Kingdom.
Helen Sebidi
Born in Marapyane, South África, 1943. Lives and works in Johannesburg, South Africa.
Henrik Olesen
Born in Esbjerg, Denmark, 1967. Lives and works in Berlin, Germany.
Hito Steyerl
Born in Munich, Germany, 1966 Lives and works in Berlin, Germany.
Iza Tarasewicz
Born in Kolonia Koplany, Poland, 1981. Lives and works in Bialystok, Poland and Berlin, Germany.
Jorge Mena Barreto
Born in Araçatuba, Brazil, 1970. Lives and works in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
José Antonio Suárez Londoño
Born in Medellín, Colombia, 1955. Lives and works in Medellín, Colombia.
José Bento
Born in Salvador, Brazil, 1962. Lives and works in Belo Horizonte, Brazil.
Kathy Barry
Born in Christchurch, New Zealand, 1967. Lives and works in Auckland, New Zealand.
Koo Jeong A
Born in Seoul, South Korea, 1967. Lives and works “everywhere.”
Lais Myrrha
Born in Belo Horizonte, Brazil, 1974. Lives and works in São Paulo, Brazil.
Lourdes Castro
Born in Funchal, Portugal, 1930. Lives and works in Ilha da Madeira, Portugal.
Luke Willis Thompson
Born in Auckland, New Zealand, 1988. Lives and works in Auckland, New Zealand.
Mariana Castillo Deball
Born in Mexico City, Mexico, 1975. Lives and works in Berlin, Germany and Mexico City, Mexico.
Michal Helfman
Born in Tel Aviv, Israel, 1973. Lives and works in Tel Aviv, Israel.
Misheck Masamvu
Born in Mutare, Zimbabwe, 1980. Lives and works in Harare, Zimbabwe.
Nomeda & Gediminas Urbonas
Born in Kaunas / Vilnius, Lithuania 1968/1966. Lives and works in Cambridge, MA, USA and Vilnius, Lithuania.
OPAVIVARÁ!
Collective, Brazil, 2005.
Öyvind Fahlström
Born in São Paulo, Brazil, 1928 – Stockholm, Sweden, 1976.
Park McArthur
Born in North Carolina, USA, 1984. Lives and works in New York, USA.
Pia Lindman
Born in Espoo, Finland, 1965. Lives and works in Finland.
Pierre Huyghe
Born in Antony, France, 1962. Lives and works in Santiago, Chile and New York, USA.
Pilar Quinteros
Born in Santiago, Chile, 1988. Lives and works in Santiago, Chile.
Priscila Fernandes
Born in Coimbra, Portugal, 1981. Lives and works in Rotterdam, The Netherlands.
Rachel Rose
Born in New York, USA, 1986. Lives and works in New York, USA.
Rikke Luther
Born in Aalborg, Denmark, 1970. Lives and works in Copenhagen, Denmark and Berlin, Germany.
Rita Ponce de León
Born in Lima, Peru, 1982. Lives and works in Mexico City, Mexico.
Ruth Ewan
Born in Aberdeen, United Kingdom, 1980. Lives and works in London, United Kingdom.
Sandra Kranich
Born in Ludwigsburg, Germany, 1971. Lives and works in Frankfurt, Germany.
Ursula Biemann
Born in Zurich, Switzerland, 1955. Lives and works in Zurich, Switzerland.
Victor Grippo
Born in Junín, Argentina, 1936 – Buenos Aires, Argentina, 2002.
Vídeo nas Aldeias
Collective, Brazil, 1986.
Vivian Caccuri
Born in São Paulo, Brasil, 1986. Lives and works in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
Wilma Martins
Born in Belo Horizonte, Brasil, 1934. Lives and works in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
William Pope L.
Born in New Jersey, USA, 1955.
Biennale Concept
Live Uncertainty
Titled Incerteza viva [Live Uncertainty], the 32nd Bienal de São Paulo will focus on notions of uncertainty to reflect on the current conditions of life and the strategies offered by contemporary art to harbor or inhabit uncertainties. The exhibition sets out to trace cosmological thinking, ambient and collective intelligence, and systemic and natural ecologies.
In order to objectively confront the big questions of our time, such as global warming and its impact on our habitats, the extinction of species and the loss of biological and cultural diversity, economic and political instability, injustice in the distribution of the Earth’s natural resources and global migration, among others, perhaps it’s necessary to detach uncertainty from fear. Uncertainty is clearly connected to notions endemic to the body and the earth, with a viral quality in organisms and ecosystems. Though it is related to the word crisis, it is not equivalent to it. Uncertainty is, above all, a psychological condition linked to individual or collective decision-making processes, describing the understanding and non-understanding of concrete problems.
The notion of uncertainty is part of the repertoire of many disciplines – from mathematics to astronomy, and also including linguistics, biology, sociology, anthropology, history and education. Unlike what goes on in other fields, though, uncertainty in art points to disorder, taking into account ambiguity and contradiction. Art feeds off uncertainty, chance, improvisation, speculation and, at the same time, it attempts to count the uncountable and measure the immeasurable. It makes room for error, for doubt and even for ghosts and the most profound misgivings, without evading or manipulating them. Would it not make sense then to take art’s numerous methods of reasoning and making and apply them to other fields of public life?
Learning to live with uncertainty can teach us solutions. Understanding the significance of Live Uncertainty on a day-to-day basis means remaining aware of the fact that we exist immersed in an environment that is ruled by it. As such, we can propose other means of action in times of constant change. Discussing uncertainty requires an understanding of the diversity of knowledge, because describing the unknown always implies to interrogate what we take for granted as known. And yet it also means valuing scientific and symbolic codes as complementary rather than exclusionary. Art promotes an active exchange between people, recognizing uncertainties as guiding generative and constructive systems.
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