Biennale of Sydney

The Biennale of Sydney is an international festival of contemporary art, held every two years in Sydney, Australia. It is the largest and best-attended contemporary visual arts event in the country. Alongside the Venice and São Paulo biennales and Documenta, it is one of the longest running exhibitions of its kind and was the first biennale to be established in the Asia-Pacific region.

In 1973 the Biennale of Sydney held its first exhibition of 37 artists in the exhibition hall of the then newly opened Sydney Opera House.

The 2002 Biennale of Sydney titled (The World May Be) Fantastic investigated 'artists and practices using fictions, narratives, invented methodologies, hypotheses, subjective belief systems, modellings, fakes and experiments as a means to make works'. Writing in Art in America in October, 2002, Michael Duncan said of the exhibition that it "gave free rein to complex, often offbeat works predicated on alternate realities." Artists included: Mike Nelson, Chris Burden, Susan Hiller, Vito Acconci, Eleanor Antin, Henry Darger, Janet Cardiff and Rodney Graham. Richard Grayson was the Artistic Director.

The 2004 Biennale of Sydney was held from 4 June - 15 August and titled On Reason and Emotion. It featured the work of 51 artists from 32 countries. Much of the exhibition was sited within Sydney’s major art museums and galleries, however a number of new projects were created for specific sites at outdoor locations within the city, such as the Royal Botanic Gardens and the forecourt of the Sydney Opera House. Isabel Carlos was the Curator.

The 2006 Biennale of Sydney was held from 8 June - 27 August and titled Zones of Contact. It featured the work of 85 artists from 44 countries and was held across 16 diverse venues throughout Sydney including Pier 2/3, at Walsh Bay, the Art Gallery of New South Wales and the Museum of Contemporary Art. Dr Charles Merewether was the Artistic Director and Curator.

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