Photograph by Manfredi Bellati
Venice Biennale: The French Pavilion – Chance. The French Pavilion presents Chance by Christian Boltanski, curated by Jean-Hubert Martin. Whispering voices talking of death (aren’t they?), clocks pointing at births and departures, human slot machines. A fluid, unstable environment harbors a reflection on the role of chance as a synthesis of fortune and misfortune, carried out in a recreational, interactive way, allowing visitors to play and win.
The French Pavilion – Chance. The Wheel of Fortune room. A long strip of photographs of newborns runs through the space at high speed. Sometimes a doorbell rings and the strip, moved by the random will of a computer, stops at one of the babies. Then, the babies face appears on a monitor. One child is chosen by chance, for better for worse. His life is still just a blank page.
The French Pavilion – Chance. The Births – Last News from Humans rooms. Colored numbers parade quickly over large computers: the green ones directly indicate the number of all humans who are born in the world, and the red ones indicates the number of all those who die. Each day on an average, there are 200,000 more children born than humans who die. We will not be replaceable, but we are happily replaced.
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