NZ Artists at Venice: Judy Millar

As well as Michael Parekowhai, the official New Zealand artist showing at the Venice Biennale there are three other artists who are in major exhibitions and locations.

Judy Millar is showing in the group show, Personal Structures: Time-Space-Existence at the Palazzo Bembo, Hye Rim Lee in the show Glassstress at the Palazzo Cavalli Franchetti and, Joseph Herscher will be constructing his installation Microclima in The Greenhouse adjacent to the Biennale Gardens

Judy Millar is returning to the Venice Biennale after her success along with Francis Upritchard when she represented New Zealand at the 53rd Venice Biennale in 2009.

Her Venice installation Giraffe-Bottle-Gun was shown at Te Papa last year. On the strength of that installation she has been invited to exhibit again at the upcoming Venice Biennale. Millar, approached by Dutch curators Karlyn De Jongh & Sarah Gold will create a new work for the exhibition Personal Structures: Time, Space, Existence, a collateral event of the Biennale. The line up of artists is extraordinary and includes revered American minimalist Carl Andre, conceptual artist Joseph Kosuth and 'the mother of performance art' Marina Abramovic.

The curators say about the exhibition “Personal Structures is a project aiming at presenting in writing, pictures and in exhibitions, a number of international artists whom we believe, for all their individuality, to have much in common concerning their intentions.”

“Personal Structures is not an artist group, but may rather be compared to an open forum,
where different individuals meet and communicate.”

In the Palazzo Bembo each artist has been provided with a room in which to create a new work for the show. Millar's work will integrate with the architectural elements of the space and her 3m meter tall canvas will literally fold out the palace window where it will be seen from the Grand Canal.

This is the first time a New Zealander has been invited to exhibit in this context and affirms Millar's international reputation which continues to gain momentum. In the lead up to this exhibition Millar will also be exhibiting new work in The Ring at Rohkunstbau, Berlin. The Ring is based on Wagner's The Ring of Nibelung and is particularly interesting for Millar, as a New Zealand artist because of its shared relationship to The Lord of the Rings.