World in motion

The Venice Biennale's 'foreigners everywhere' theme leaves Adrian Searle beguiled, tantalised - and frequently appalled

- Adrian Searle

Venice. Terrible. Foreigners everywhere, and it is even worse during the biennale. Marked by unrest and protests, the 60th Venice Biennale leaves us uncertain of art's ability to draw us together in a world in crisis. It is filled with the clamour of conflicting voices and doubtful purpose.

On posters and on the sides of the water buses, written in neon and hung in the entrances to the central pavilion in the Giardini and to the Arsenale, the phrase Foreigners Everywhere, written in languages living, endangered and dead, is ubiquitous. Dangling in a roofed-over section of the medieval dock, the words multiply, reflecting brightly in the waters below with a cheer that belies a general unease. Often muttered in under-the-breath complaint, Foreigners Everywhere also celebrates difference, and the multiplicity of voices that fill the city. It also provides the title to curator and artistic director Adriano Pedrosa's keynote exhibition.

The phrase is also an ongoing work by Palermo-based "readymade artist" Claire Fontaine. Claire Fontaine (who are actually a duo) have lent the phrase's pungency and ambiguity to a biennale that I wish were so succinct. There are longueurs. There are detours and incomprehensible delays. Interrupted by strange encounters and chance meetings, occasionally we are astonished and beguiled, led astray, tantalised and sometimes shocked.

Every one of us is a foreigner somewhere, often even when we are at home.