It fits well with the ideals of the 1960's

The biennials of contemporary art flower today around the world. Principle: a surging current creations that is supposed to give air time through disparate projects. It is the Tower, until December 12, one of the most prestigious biennials in the world, that of São Paulo, which occupies the whole of a gigantic Pavilion designed by the architect star of the country, Centennial Oscar Niemeyer.

The figures are impressive: 859 159 artists selected by 7 Commissioners works. But the most striking of this grand show is consistency in the comments. In a rapidly changing economic, political and social Brazil, the highly political nature of this 29eédition is not surprising.

The power to disrupt

A trend that does not necessarily translates into a "nice" or decorative art. Any more than by a commercial art - very popular, including at the Venice Biennale, in recent years. The two Commissioners in Chief of the exposure, Agnaldo Farias and Moacir dos Anjos, explained: "on the one hand, art is which, in his own way, singular, destabilizes the usual references in our way of seeing the world.". The other, under its power to disrupt, art is able to reconfigure the the trade. In this sense it is really impossible to separate the art of politics.

The São Paulo Biennale political art is therefore everywhere. Take one of the most impressive of the event. Signed by the Brazilian Henrique Oliveira (born 1973), it is called "The origin of the third world" and consists of a series of caves in the abundant protuberances, designed in a wood of recovery is the Palisades, the Brazil. The title is an allusion to the famous Courbet table which shows another cave entrance, a female. The material chosen, he made reference to a "arte povera", voluntarily modest material in the poorer world. Two gives a work plastically and conceptually strong. The work of Oliveira has been shown in Paris in 2008 at the galerie Georges-Philippe & Nathalie Vallois.

The Turkish Kutlug Attaman (born 1961), who lives in London, projected on the walls of a room in black films representative of beggars in action and close-up. They are disabled, terrified, hagard looking. It is visually assaulted becoming aware of this aesthetic of begging that was already in the classic painting as in children of Murillo Street.

Ideals of the 1960s

One of the papesses of Brazilian contemporary art is Lygia Pape (1927-2004). In 1968, she had designed a sheet of 15 square metres through many orifices through which some extras spent their head. This piece, "Divisor", has been recreated in 2010 and the filmed action. The sheet moves with movements. Heads exceed. A common harmony by the singularity of the faces. The idea to be both together and single. The experience is fascinating. But dated. It fits well with the ideals of the 1960's.

As this photo of the Argentine Oscar Bony (1941-2002) which reflects another performance, completed in 1968. It shows a father, a mother and a child in large format. The child is working on a book of schoolboy. Parents monitor. The family is sitting on a small stage. In fact, Bony asked the family of workers pose as living sculptures an exposure time, simulating the routine of the day. The father was paid twice his salary for this performance.

In a more current spirit of the Chinese artist Cao Fei (born 1978) developed on the Web and in the form of an interactive cartoon of the "Second life" type a megacity like to be mistaken in Shanghai. Except that Cao Fei appointed her "rmb city" by the name of the Chinese currency. Social criticism is obvious. In this city of capitalist dreams with a red "Small book" fragrance, Mao is represented as a slender young character that flies. As the ideals...

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