After the firestorm: First look at Australian artist’s Venice Biennale works

Venice: Australia has opened its pavilion at the world’s biggest art festival after a political firestorm over the artist chosen to represent the country – and the result is a mesmerising work about acceptance.

Visitors entered the darkened pavilion at the Venice Biennale to encounter a multimedia installation of vivid colours inspired by the poetry of a Sufi mystic.

The artist, Khaled Sabsabi, is describing the work as a search for the “innermost part of the heart” using images that slowly appear across eight screens beneath a bright white light.

International media saw the work for the first time at the “pre-opening” stage of the Biennale on Tuesday, with hundreds of visitors seeing the installation and some sharing videos on social media.

They also saw a companion work at the main exhibition of the biennale – the result of a pivotal decision by the curator of the event, Koyo Kouoh, to ensure Sabsabi was represented after the controversy last year when the artist’s invitation to represent Australia at Venice was rescinded, then reinstated.

Art curator Elizabeth Ann Macgregor called Sabsabi’s work in the separate Arsenale show “astounding” and “stunning” when she saw it on Tuesday and shared it on Instagram.

While the Australian pavilion is funded by the federal government, this year’s exhibition was also backed by private donors led by investor and philanthropist Simon Mordant and a long list of benefactors including the Turnbull Foundation, set up by former prime minister Malcolm Turnbull and former Sydney Lord Mayor Lucy Turnbull.

In the description of the artwork handed to visitors to the pavilion, Sabsabi writes of being inspired by a poem from the 12th century, The Conference of the Birds, by Sufi mystic Farid-al-din Attar, which tells of a journey of self-discovery.

“Truth isn’t something you find; it is something you become ready to see,” he says in the notes. Drawing on the poem, the artwork at the biennale is called “conference of one’s self”.

The nation’s peak arts body, Creative Australia, chose Sabsabi and curator Michael Dagostini to represent the country early last year but revoked the decision within days of the announcement after a media storm over a work Sabsabi created almost two decades ago.

In the 2007 work, Sabsabi featured a video of Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of Hezbollah, the Lebanese militia that is listed as a terrorist group in Australia. A description of the work at the time said it used light that suggested “divine illumination” around Nasrallah.

When that triggered media criticism, and questions from Liberal Senator Clare Chandler in federal parliament, the peak arts body rushed to cancel the selection.

Sabsabi told this masthead’s Good Weekend magazine last month that the 2007 video was about the “power of propaganda” rather than glorifying Hezbollah.

“I’ve always, always, always said personally that hate and violence are only going to cause more hate and violence,” he said.

The Australian pavilion was a relatively quiet corner of the Biennale, amid a furore over the wider exhibition and whether Russia and Israel should be allowed to take part.

The biennale has insisted on allowing Russia to exhibit despite the war in Ukraine, triggering the resignation of the jury meant to select the best entries from 100 national representatives, because jury members wanted to exclude countries accused of crimes against humanity.

The Russian pavilion was the scene of thumping dance music at the pre-opening day, as visitors enjoyed drinks to celebrate the inclusion. The victory was symbolic, however, because the exhibit will not remain open after the first days of the event.

The Israeli pavilion appeared to be closed, given the stand-off with the jury. Israel has been accused of war crimes in Gaza, but it denies this and insists it is defending itself against Hamas, which launched attacks on Israeli civilians in October 2023.

The biennale organisers have not excluded Israel from the event, despite the stance taken by the jury members.

With the jury gone, the decision on the winner of the biennale’s major award, the Golden Lion (won by Australia’s Archie Moore in 2024), is being replaced by a popular vote from visitors on the best participant in the main exhibition and the best representative in the national pavilions.

Kouoh, the biennale curator, chose Sabsabi and Dagostino for the event’s main exhibition after they had been dropped by Creative Australia. Kouoh died in May last year, but her team continued to prepare the biennale without her.

The outcome is that Sabsabi and Dagostino gain the rare honour of featuring in the main exhibition at the biennale as well as their country’s national pavilion.

Only three other artists have ever done this in the history of the biennale, which was founded in 1895.

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