Antique

In The Shame In Venice 2, Kenyan artist Michael Soi protests the makeup of his country's pavilion at the Biennale.

There's something sketchy at this year's Venice Biennale – the international art exhibition sometimes dubbed the Olympics of the contemporary art world.

When you come to the Kenyan pavilion, almost all of the artists will be ... Chinese.

The Biennale, one of the oldest and most important exhibitions of contemporary art in the world, takes place in Venice every two years.

Thirty countries, including the U.S., have a permanent slot.



"Thank You Africa" is by one of two Kenyan citizens who will exhibit at the Biennale. He is Armando Tanzini, a 72-year-old Italian-born painter, sculptor and real estate magnate who has lived in the country for nearly a half a century.

About 50 other countries have applied for their own exhibition space, called a pavilion. The East African country of Kenya hosted its first pavilion in 2013, and plans to host another this year, featuring mainly Chinese nationals. None of them have apparently ever been to Africa or reference it in their work.

The controversial roster — including contemporary artists Qin Feng, Shi Jinsong, Li Zhanyang, Lan Zheng Hui, Li Gang, and others — has provoked outrage among Kenyan bloggers and artists. It's also provoked a sense of deja vu — the same thing happened in 2013. Kenya's first-ever pavilion was also overwhelmingly Chinese.

"I was a member of the jury for the last Biennale in 2013 and the Kenyan Pavilion was shambolic," writes Olabisi Silva on Facebook. The founder and director of the Centre for Contemporary Art in Lagos, Nigeria, wrote that the Kenyan pavilion was "full of Chinese and Italian artists with some [Kenyan artists] in a dark room."

"A frightening manifestation of neocolonialism vulgarly presented as multiculturalism," wrote Wenny Teo in a critique of the 2013 exhibit, "to be avoided like the plague."

In Nairobi, where the Kenyan contemporary art scene is gaining traction with serious art buyers, the news is being felt not just as an artistic flop but as a colossal missed opportunity. "It's a kick in the stomach," says Sylvia Gichia, director of Kuona Trust, an artist's collective and residency program in Nairobi. Organizations like hers work hard to bring Nairobi's artistic renaissance to a global audience via art fairs and art auctions.

Needless to say she is dismayed that the 370,000 art lovers who visit the Biennale will see none of the work that's driving the contemporary Kenyan scene. "What," Gichia asks, "do the Chinese have to do with visual arts in Kenya?"

Nobody in Kenya's government will answer that question. (Calls and texts to the personal cell phone of Nairobi's Minister of Culture, Dr Hassan Wario, went unanswered.) In most countries, the government either selects the artists or assigns that duty to a private gallery. In Kenya, the government apparently played no role other than to fob off the job to an Italian curator, Paola Poponi.

Poponi cannot say she's ever stepped foot in Kenya, but her official title is "commissioner" of the Kenyan pavilion, the same title she held in 2013. She defended the choice of artists, in an email liberal with capitalizations, saying that the Kenyan pavilion ably expressed the international theme of this 56th Biennale, which is All The World's Futures.

Poponi wrote, "Talking about art FROM ANOTHER PART OF THE WORLD during an art exhibition can be useful for KENYA, always more able to create its OWN IDENTITY." She said that art should not be constrained by geography and explained in a follow-up email that "MEETING THE REST OF THE WORLD" would enable Kenyan artists analyze their own experiences "more deeply."

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