La obsesión del tiempo / The obsession of time

The curators has entitled their project Expérience de la durée ; literally, "Experiencing duration." But the trace of the time coordinate can only be deduced in the audiovisual works, and perhaps in the installations and penetrable works, that, obviously, require a few minutes of strolling through the space they occupy. Consequently, there are no great subtleties regarding the interpretation of "time" in this proposal. Literality spreads through this project, although this does not mean it is always easy to find the trace of temporality in the different pieces selected. Some present diverse texts that one has to stop and read, something that can become irritating; others require the viewer to concentrate on the evolution of the image. This is the case of the videos and films, which often do not develop a story line of any kind. There are also proposals that require an experimentation of space, with viewers having to walk through the areas to understand the ultimate meaning. Finally, there are other works that request time for assimilation, sometimes because they have to be discovered and isolated from a context that is foreign to art, and others because they require an effort for their visual or conceptual comprehension. In all cases, it is evident that the curators have split hairs with the concept of time.

Considering the specific interest of the works present at this edition of the Biennial, apart from the curatorial discourse, we can point out some projects located in the three main venues housing the exhibitions. Thus, in La Sucrière, viewers can enjoy Martin Creed's amusing penetrable exhibit Work Nº 329: Half the Air in a Given Space , a room that viewers have to cross jumping over the sea of fuchsia balloons that crowds it. On exiting this space, we encounter Virginie Barré's disturbing Escarlate , a crimson room where an inert female body appears among white balloon lamps, a mannequin in a red dress that one supposes the blood has poured from, blood that is symbolised on the floor by a ruby surface on which there is a pair of black high-heel shoes. Music from the 1940s is played in the background, emphasising the scene's melancholic nature. Ann-Veronica Janssens' lee 12! is another remarkable penetrable work. An interior area flooded by a thick greenish mist. Conversely, Saâdane Atif presents an attractive sonorous work, Power Chords (2005), composed by eleven electric guitars and their corresponding amplifiers, "played" automatically thanks to a computer programme and a mechanical system.

Returning to the entertainment aspect, and accentuating the request for involvement, Rivane Neuenschwander's work 25 Carioca N.02 A Volta Dos Três Cavaleiros (1994) is composed by eight modules that act as pages, presenting a series of "bubbles" that viewers can complete with the legends they desire. Fabien Verschaere's environmental and audiovisual proposal, entitled Magic Travel Take Away (2005), seems grotesque, a genuinely adolescent idea strongly influenced by manga cartoons and music videos. At a great distance from this silly piece, we find Erwin Wurm's biting project entitled Adorno Was Wrong With His Ideas About Art (2005), consisting in several wood or conglomerate boards with different instructions to create his famous minute sculptures.

As regards audiovisual works, the most important in La Sucrière are a film acted by puppets This Is Not A Time For Dreaming , by Pierre Huyghe, and, albeit only as a historical reference, Andy Warhol's film Sleep (1963), that simply shows a man sleeping. Related to this feature, Yoko Ono's film, Smile - Film Nº 5 (1968), screened at the Institute d'Art Contemporain de Villeurbanne, also focuses on a trivial everyday activity, showing John Lennon smiling in slow-motion. This venue also accommodates the computer animation My Birds... Trash... The Future , by Paul Chan. An attractive proposal, using both sides of the screen to project a desolate, apocalyptic landscape, with a spirit fiercely anchored in the videogame aesthetics. Also accommodated at the Institute, the site-specific intervention by Kendell Geers, On the Declamation and Preemenence of the Female Sex , is another interesting piece, despite the ties of the complicated discourse it is based on.

At the Musée d'Art Contemporain de Lyon, one of the most notable pieces is Seven Minutes Before (2004), by Melik Ohanian: seven synchronised video-projections bestowed with major visual strength. The installation with sound and colour effects by Brian Eno, Quiet Club , is also alluring, albeit only on the sensorial plane. In the room Le Rectangle, Wim Delvoye exhibits a large series of two-dimensional pieces with advertising labels showing a laughing cow, and different experimental films are screened at Le Fort Saint-Jean.

Thus the Lyon Biennial has seen the passing of another edition, without risking much and, therefore, without jeopardising its self-controlled spirit.

Translation: Laura F. Farhall