U. S. Pavilion Unveils New Joan Jonas Work

Venice, Italy, May 7, 2015 - Joan Jonas's They Come to Us without a Word is presented by the MIT List Visual Arts Center in cooperation with the U.S. Department of State at the 56th International Art Exhibition - la Biennale di Venezia. Jonas, a pioneering figure in video and performance art, is occupying the entirety of the Pavilion's five galleries with a new video installation involving drawings and sculptural elements. A new performance by the artist will take place in July at the Teatro Piccolo Arsenale in Venice, with new music by Jonas's long-time sound collaborator, American jazz pianist and composer Jason Moran.

Co-curated by Paul C. Ha, Director of the MIT List Visual Arts Center and Ute Meta Bauer, Director of the NTU Centre for Contemporary Art Singapore, Nanyang Technological University, They Come to Us without a Word evolved out of an earlier work, Reanimation, first presented as a performance in 2010 at MIT, where Jonas has taught for 15 years. Reanimation was partly inspired by the writings of Icelandic author Halldór Laxness and his poetic portrayal of the natural world. They Come to Us without a Word evokes the fragility of nature in a rapidly changing situation, with each room of the Pavilion depicting a specific subject, such as bees or fish.

Fragments of ghost stories sourced from an oral tradition in Cape Breton, Nova Scotia, form a nonlinear narrative linking one room to the next. "Ghosts are very much alive there, as in all parts of the world," Jonas states. "We are haunted, the rooms are haunted."

In each of the four rooms of the Pavilion there are two video projections-one presenting the main motif of the room and the other the ghost narrative, a continuous thread running through the exhibition spaces.

Free-standing rippled mirrors, conceived by Jonas and handcrafted in Murano specifically for this project, are placed in each room alongside Jonas's highly distinctive drawings and kites, as well as a selection of objects that were used as props in her videos. This arrangement creates the sense of a stage set. Similar mirrors cover the panels of the Pavilion's rotunda, where old Venetian crystal beads hang on a chandelier-like structure suspended from the middle of the ceiling. The ambience reflects the viewer and the exterior of the Giardini intersected by video images. An outdoor piece in the courtyard, consisting of tree trunks from the nearby Certosa Island held tightly together by copper wire, echoes the themes of the exhibition.

Jonas developed the videos in New York in winter 2015, during a series of workshops with children ranging in age from five to 16 performing against video backdrops of landscapes shot by Jonas mostly in Nova Scotia, Canada, and Brooklyn, New York. Sources also include several early videos by Jonas. They Come to Us without a Word is animated by a soundtrack designed by Jonas, using excerpts of music by Jason Moran and songs by the Norwegian Sami singer Ánde Somby. The customized lighting is conceived by designer Jan Kroeze.

The video footage shown in the Pavilion is being reedited for the performance They Come to Us without a Word II, as Jonas further explores the themes of the Pavilion. Jason Moran will develop the music for the project and play live in the performances. Details are available at www.JoanJonasVenice2015.com.

"Although the idea of my work involves the question of how the world is so rapidly and radically changing, I do not address the subject directly or didactically," said Jonas. "Rather, the ideas are implied poetically through sound, lighting, and the juxtaposition of images of children, animals, and landscape."

Jonas has been a tenured visual arts professor at MIT for the past 15 years, and is currently Professor Emerita in the MIT Program in Art, Culture, and Technology (ACT) in MIT's School of Architecture + Planning, making the artist's installation for the U.S. Pavilion an exceptional moment in her long-standing relationship with MIT. The List is renowned for presenting groundbreaking contemporary artwork and has always served as a creative laboratory where artists are free to experiment-a leadership position that has been affirmed by the List's selection as the commissioning institution for the U.S. Pavilion for the third time in the past 15 years, having organized the pavilions by Fred Wilson in 2003 and Ann Hamilton in 1999.

"Joan's voice and vision have been powerful forces in contemporary art for five decades, and I am thrilled to present They Come to Us without a Word in Venice, one of the most iconic forums for the presentation of cutting-edge artwork," said Paul C. Ha, Director of the MIT List Visual Arts Center. "Joan's selection is not only an acknowledgement of her outstanding contributions to the art world thus far, but also an investment in the innovative promise of her future work."

"As I know from working with Joan as both a curator and educator, one does not only see her work, one experiences it. Her multimedia installations make a lasting impression, and her ability to work with spaces in a sensual way turns a visit to the U.S. Pavilion in Venice into a profound encounter," said Ute Meta Bauer, Director of the NTU Centre for Contemporary Art Singapore, Nanyang Technological University.

Jonas's work developed out of her art-historical studies and sculptural practice, and expanded to performance and film in the 1960s through her involvement with the New York avant-garde. Jonas has employed an interdisciplinary approach throughout her career, being one of the first artists to explore the potential of the video camera as a tool for image-making and the TV monitor as a sculptural object. At the same time, she has experimented in developing her own visual language in relation to the figure and physical space. Her installations, video works, and performances bring these components together with drawings, props, objects, and language, reflecting her research into how the image is altered through the mediums of mirror, distance, video, and narrative. In Venice, she pursues this research in relation to figure and ground, working with new themes, like ghost stories, while integrating all the diverse aspects of her practice.

"We are especially proud to be presenting an MIT professor as the representative artist for the United States at the Venice Biennale," said Philip S. Khoury, Ford International Professor of History and Associate Provost, who oversees the arts at MIT. "Joan's fearlessly experimental work is emblematic of MIT and the List's mission to foster the creation of intellectually investigative, challenging artwork, and we have no doubt that her installation for the U.S. Pavilion will push new boundaries and captivate audiences in ways that were previously unimaginable."

A fully illustrated catalogue, published by Gregory R. Miller & Co., will be released in June in conjunction with the exhibition They Come to Us without a Word. Edited by Jane Farver, the publication will feature essays by Ann Reynolds, Ingrid Schaffner, and Marina Warner.

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