Documentary “Seizing Venice” revisits the 1964 Venice Biennale scandal

Every generation seems to get its fair share of scandalous, high-profile art exhibitions. The most recent one was Documenta 15 in 2022, which caused so much controversy that the show may never be held in Kassel, Germany in the future. And, of course, there was the 1993 Whitney Biennial, which introduced so-called identity politics into mainstream art discourse. Going back even further, there are the New York Armory Show in 1913, the first Impressionist exhibition in 1874, and the Paris Salon in 1865, where Manet’s works were exhibited. olympia It caused a sensation.

In all of these cases, it was the art on display that caused the uproar, not the forces behind the exhibition itself. A different situation emerged at the 1964 Venice Biennale. The show is remembered, but not always fondly remembered, for the fact that Robert Rauschenberg won the show’s painting prize (the precursor to today’s Golden Lion) – a selection that some say carries the weight of the jury and Other insiders who interfered with the exhibition smelled of corruption.

Capture VeniceA new documentary released in limited release next month wants viewers to revisit a period of history that has been in many ways forgotten due to the outsize role Rauschenberg and his associates have since played in the art historical canon.

The documentary points out that since the United States has never had a Ministry of Culture like many European countries, the country’s national pavilion in Venice is an anomaly. It was built not by the U.S. government but by philanthropist Walter Leighton Clark and his artists’ cooperative, the Grand Central Art Galleries, with ownership later transferred to various museums. However, the 1964 pavilion was the first organized by a government entity, the Fine Arts Division of the United States Information Agency (USIA). After all, it was the height of the Cold War, and the United States was there to win the Cold War, to ensure the victory of liberal democracy over communism. Then culture will be an extension of soft power.

Commissioners, insiders, dealers and artists appear. These were the code names given by film director and art critic Amei Wallach to Alan Solomon, the pioneering curator who at the time was credited with bringing the Jewish Museum to Credited with turning to support avant-garde art; curator Alice Denney, a friend of the Kennedy family and wife of a State Department intelligence researcher; New York gallerist Leo Castelli; and Rauschenberg, respectively. Wallach draws inspiration from the spy genre and connects them into a web.

The purpose of this group (excluding Rauschenberg) was to ensure that Americans could win the jackpot as never before. “One of the interesting subplots of biennials over the decades, over a century, has been the overlap of art and politics. “With the advent of America in 1964, it reached its peak — there was a kind of high-altitude moment. It was There are echoes in history,” said Philip Rylands, former director of the Peggy Guggenheim Museum in Venice. The artist Michelangelo Pistoletto (who appears on screen with a tag that reads “He’s There”) put it more succinctly, “This is the missing crown of American politics.”

Denny dismissed the accusations, telling Wallach simply: “We didn’t cheat. We wanted to win awards and show that we had some great art. We thought we had a good chance with Rauschenberg.”

Over the next 90 minutes, Wallach tells the story of what happened, although for a documentary that aims to tell a clear history, the film’s non-linear structure is a bit confusing, especially for those who haven’t done it yet Prepare for an audience with a background in postwar art history.

More coherently, by 1964 Rauschenberg had already achieved wider acclaim, having achieved an artistic breakthrough a decade earlier with his “assembly” works that broke down the barrier between painting and sculpture. But his reception in New York was not entirely welcoming. New Yorker Staff writer Calvin Tomkins, who was also present, called him “a nuisance in the American art world.” Rauschenberg admitted in archival interviews that he was viewed as a “clown” and a “novelty”.

Still, Solomon, whose first exhibition at the Jewish Museum was a mid-career retrospective of Rauschenberg, still believed in the artist and planned to show him in Venice with a group of boundary-pushing creators: Jasper Jones , Claes Oldenburg, John Chamberlain, Jim Dine, and two Abstract Expressionists, Kenneth Nolan and Maurice Lewis.

Rauschenberg’s art is steeped in Americana, from JFK Airport to the Space Race, from the Statue of Liberty to Coca-Cola, all of which appear in the silkscreens he will exhibit in Venice. (The lengthy film includes all of these references as if its makers were just trying to kill time.) In a rare moment of clarity, the film notes that Rauschenberg’s use of these was more than just celebratory; Rather, it is “a commentary on how to sustain a superpower,” said art historian Hiroko Ikegami, who has written about Rauschenberg’s rise.

But Solomon found the U.S. Pavilion too small to realize his ambitions, and sought a second location. (Wallach suggests that Salomon is responsible for the rise of off-site ancillary events that are now ubiquitous at modern biennales.) He found the recently closed U.S. Consulate in Venice to be a fitting fit. Nolan and Lewis were placed in the pavilion, and everything else was left to the consulate, with assurances (verbal, not written) that Rauschenberg would still be eligible for the grand prize. Although Kennedy was assassinated six months before the exhibition opened, the exhibition continued with the full support of the U.S. government.

Sam Hunter, an American with a truly international artistic resume, has been included on the seven-person jury that will decide the grand prize winner. This caused a lot of concern because the works were shipped from the United States on military aircraft loaned by the Department of Defense. Denny, who helped secure the plane through government connections, said they just didn’t have the money to ship it any other way. (However, their arrival, escorted by the military, immediately sparked rumors at the Biennale that, according to Wallach’s retelling, the U.S. government had rigged the Grand Prix competition.)

To prove malfeasance, we’ve put together a list of quotes. Solomon later wrote that he and others “planned” Rauschenberg’s victory. Lois Bingham, former director of the Fine Arts Section of the American Institute of Architects, said years later that artists on display must have valid approval from the House Un-American Activities Committee. Given the anti-communist fervor and U.S. foreign policy at the time, this latter point was perhaps the most damning, although it was not entirely illuminating.

But key parts of the story, which may establish what really happened, are mostly just hints, suggesting that Castelli and his ex-wife Illyana Sonnabend, who owned a gallery in Paris at the time, were behind it.Notably, when the Metropolitan Museum of Art purchased Jackson Pollock’s 1950 work, Wallach falsely suggested that Castelli helped establish the contemporary art market Autumn Rhythm (No. 30) Priced at $30,000 in 1957; it was sold by Sidney Janis, not Castelli. The only nefarious thing Sonnabend did officially, at least within the scope of this film, was promote Rauschenberg’s performance in Venice via email. Putting cynicism aside for a moment, this isn’t exactly the unethical behavior Wallach is implying. Perhaps Sonnabend was ahead of its time in supporting artists.

However, the jury was not initially unanimous in awarding the prize to Rauschenberg, especially since most of his paintings were exhibited in the U.S. Consulate Building and not in the U.S. Pavilion in Giardini. So, at the last minute, the organizers transferred several canvases to the pavilion via speedboat and hung them on makeshift walls, as they were built just outside the pavilion. (A last-minute performance by the Merce Cunningham Dance Company at the Phoenix Theatre, wearing costumes designed by Rauschenberg, also helped save the day.) Against all odds, Rauschenberg prevailed and was stampeded in the square Parade on the shoulders of Italian artists.

Overall, the film has more of the tone of the elder statesmen of the art world, telling the biggest scandal they’ve ever seen through some lurid gossip and a compelling detail or two. It lacks the solid evidence a good documentary needs: cold hard facts.

This is not to say that it was unlikely or even unlikely that Castelli and the USIA would have resorted to unsavory tactics to ensure Rauschenberg’s victory. But Wallach didn’t provide much evidence to prove this beyond a reasonable doubt, which is exactly what you need to prevent conspiracy theories from spreading online these days. Sure, it’s a good story, but there’s not enough confirmation here.

Perhaps the film’s most salient point is that despite the 1964 grand prize being won by an American, the U.S. government still failed to meaningfully invest in arts and culture. The following year, the American Institute of Architects closed its fine arts department. Today, the museum has been approved by the State Council, but has received very little government funding, only $375,000 this year. Whether or not Rauschenberg’s competition was stolen, what the 1964 Biennale did was publicly declare that the center of the postwar art world was New York, not Paris, as Solomon wrote in the exhibition statement. An entire country exists outside of this city, but to this day the artists who represent the United States are often based there. In 2024, perhaps the most pressing question is, when will New York resign?