Spanish Pavilion at the
54th International Art Exhibition –
la Biennale di Venezia
4 June–27 November 2011
Spanish Pavilion
Giardini della Biennale
Castello 30122
Venezia
The artist proposes a single piece, an extended performance for the Pavilion, which is organized by the Secretary of State for International Cooperation of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Cooperation, through the Directorate of Cultural and Scientific Relations of the AECID and with the support of Spanish Cultural Action (AC/E).
Dora García proposes a single piece titled L’Inadeguato, Lo Inadecuado, The Inadequate, an ensemble performance that will evolve constantly throughout the six months of the Biennale and involve nearly seventy participants. The performance will be accompanied by a publication and a guide to the performance and make use of a series of objects and documents that will be presented to the public in archive format.
In the artist’s own words, “The Inadequate aims to replace the idea of exhibition with that of occupation, the idea of an artist’s show with that of a theatre of exhibitions, the idea of a national pavilion with a pavilion known to a specific country and its history.”
The concept of inadequacy to which the title refers is perfectly explained by the following words by Erving Goffman in Encounters (1961): “to be awkward or unkempt, to talk or move wrongly is to be a dangerous giant, a destroyer of worlds. As every psychotic and comic ought to know, an accurately improper move can poke through the thin sleeve of immediate reality.”
In the curator’s words: “In the Spanish pavilion, García proposes the project L’Inadeguato, Lo Inadecuado, The Inadequate, which literally refers to the feeling of inadequacy that the artist felt with regards to her role in the complex environment of the Biennale and the Spanish Pavilion in which she had been invited to participate. In this light, García draws on the sociologist Erving Goffman’s thesis on inadequacy. The project consists in a single work: ‘an extended performance’ that will take place throughout the duration of the Venice Biennale and that, as she explains, underlines the ‘violent fragility of everything we consider adequate. It is a form of dissidence, of escaping from the centre. The Inadequate responds to the need not to meet expectations, of not being what is expected of one’.
For the artist, the concept of inadequacy extends beyond the realm of art and enters into that of social taboo. The Inadequate pursues a comprehension of marginality as a conceptual approach to creativity, with political and economic as well as social ramifications. Here marginality is considered a political position within art practice, and inadequacy a need to distance oneself from the prevailing cultural discourse.”
The Inadequate is an artwork of joint authorship, which from the outset has involved a group of artists, art critics and writers, with Dora García playing the part of initiator and host.
Organized by the Secretary of State for International Cooperation of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Cooperation, through the Directorate of Cultural and Scientific Relations of the AECID with the support of Spanish Cultural Action (AC/E), L’Inadeguato, Lo Inadecuado, The Inadequate will have a website which will track the development of the project: www.theinadequate.net
You can follow The Inadequate at:
Facebook: Dora García at the Spanish Pavilion. Biennale di Venezia
Twitter: Spanish Pavilion
For International Media Enquiries: Brunswick Arts;
spanish-pavilion@brunswickgroup.com; +44 (0)207 936 1290.
For Local Media Enquiries: RMS La Asociación: Marta de la Torriente (marta@rms.com.es)
