The number of Canadians exhibiting at the 2015 Venice Biennale continues to grow. In an announcement yesterday, Montreal gallery Art Mûr revealed that two artists from their roster, Simon Bilodeau and Guillaume Lachapelle, will be included in a large group show as a part of the officially recognized collateral programming at the Biennale.
Bilodeau and Lachapelle’s work will be shown in “Personal Structures,” an exhibition at Palazza Mora and the Palazzo Bembo, near the Rialto Bridge. The group show will feature more than 50 artists, including Marina Abramović, Carl Andre and Joseph Kosuth. Global Art Affairs Foundation, a Dutch nonprofit focused on exploring philosophy through contemporary art and architecture, is supporting the show.
Born in 1981 in Laval, Quebec, Bilodeau makes monochromatic installations that depict post-apocalyptic imagined worlds. He has participated in more than 20 group exhibitions in Quebec and Europe, received the Plein sud Fellowship and was listed as a finalist for the SCOPE Foundation Award.
Lachapelle, born in 1974 in Stoke, Quebec, also frequently works in installation, using sculpture and miniatures to repurpose objects. He has created two permanent public works in Montreal: a commemorative sculpture in Belmont Park, and a piece at the Père-Ambroise library.
Bilodeau and Lachapelle join a number of other Canadians featured in collateral programming at the 2015 Venice Biennale, including Jordan Bennett and Anne Troake, whose work will be presented in Newfoundland and Labrador’s exhibition, “Under the Surface,” and Jean-Pierre Aubé, who will enact a series of live interventions during the event’s preview days.
