BNLMTL 2014:
L’avenir
(looking forward)

October 22, 2014 – January 4, 2015

L’avenir (looking forward) examines recent developments in contemporary art in relationship to speculation, futurity and the history of future projection, and the currency of projecting into the future. The idea of “what is to come” provides a framework for considering our current condition from geopolitical, environmental, technological, scientific, social, cultural, ideological, economic, ethical and metaphysical perspectives.

Accordingly, BNLMTL 2014 will present film, sculpture, photography, painting and installation that respond to current conditions by considering “what is to come”. It will include works that are socially responsive to challenges presented by possible futures and situational, performative and temporal practices that address the vexed questions of the current agency of art, its transformational potential and ability to influence the future.

States of performance and temporality are evoked in the project title by the idea of “looking forward”, which involves an action that simultaneously engages the present and future. To look forward implies picturing a future moment: this process is intrinsic to the project, which examines the relationship of sight to consciousness and its role in both witnessing the present and imagining the future. Ultimately, L’avenir (looking forward) aims to look backwards from possible futures to consider the present and to address the connectedness of the local to the global.

BNLMTL 2014 is presented by La Biennale de Montréal and co-produced with the Musée d’art contemporain de Montréal.

Participating artists and collectives:
Abbas Akhavan (Toronto); Adaptive Actions (Jean-Maxime Dufresne and Jean-François Prost) (Montréal); Edgar Arceneaux (Los Angeles); Arctic Perspective Initiative (Matthew Biederman and Marko Peljhan) (Montréal and Nove Gorica, Slovenia); Nicolas Baier (Montréal); Taysir Batniji (Paris); Amanda Beech (Los Angeles); Ursula Biemann (Zurich); Raymond Boisjoly (Vancouver); Andrea Bowers (Los Angeles); Matthew Buckingham (New York); Mikko Canini (Toronto); Simon Denny (Berlin); Dave Dyment (Toronto); Charles Gaines (Los Angeles); Ryan Gander (London); Goldin+Senneby (Stockholm); Babak Golkar (Vancouver); Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster (Paris and Rio de Janeiro); Nicolas Grenier (Montréal and Los Angeles); Isabelle Hayeur (Rawdon, QC); Thomas Hirschhorn (Paris); Klara Hobza (Berlin); Richard Ibghy and Marilou Lemmens (Montréal and Durham-Sud, QC); Simone Jones and Lance Winn (Toronto and Wilmington, DE); Emmanuelle Léonard (Montréal); Ann Lislegaard (Copenhagen and New York); Basim Magdy (Cairo and Basel, Switzerland); Lynne Marsh (Berlin, London and Montréal); John Massey (Toronto); Jillian Mayer (South Florida); Shirin Neshat (New York); Jacqueline Hoang Nguyen (Stockholm and Montréal); Susan Norrie (Sydney); Melik Ohanian (Paris and New York); Li Ran (Beijing); Kelly Richardson (Whitley Bay, England); Kevin Schmidt (Berlin and Vancouver); Skawennati (Montréal); Steele & Tomczak (Lisa Steele and Kim Tomczak) (Toronto); Hito Steyerl (Berlin); Oleg Tcherny (Paris and Venice); Althea Thauberger (Vancouver); David Tomas (Montréal); Suzanne Treister (London); Étienne Tremblay-Tardif (Montréal); Susan Turcot (Whitstable, England and Kamouraska, QC); Anton Vidokle and Pelin Tan (New York, Berlin, Istanbul and Mardin, Turkey); Hajra Waheed (Montréal); Lawrence Weiner (New York and Amsterdam); and Krzysztof Wodiczko (New York and Cambridge, MA)

76 days
50 artists and collectives
23 new works
22 countries: Australia, Belarus, Brazil, Canada, China, Denmark, Egypt, France, Germany, Iran, Italy, Netherlands, New Zealand, Palestine, Poland, Russia, Slovenia, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, United Kingdom and the Unites States
4 curators: Gregory Burke, Peggy Gale, Lesley Johnstone and Mark Lanctôt
3 publications

“Working from different histories, artistic traditions, cultural contexts and mobility, the artists of BNLMTL 2014 inevitably propose vastly different futures,” says co-curator Gregory Burke. “Many works address geopolitical concerns, insinuate ethical questions and hint at economic alternatives. Others point to the ‘what is to come’ of art, that is, how effective is it and what will it become?”

The 2014 edition of BNLMTL has been completely reimagined with new executive and curatorial leadership and vision. L’avenir (looking forward) was conceptualized by co-curators Gregory Burke and Peggy Gale, and developed in tandem with co-curators Lesley Johnstone and Mark Lanctôt of the Musée d’art contemporain de Montréal. All four curators worked in close collaboration with Sylvie Fortin, Executive and Artistic Director of La Biennale de Montréal.

About La Biennale de Montréal
The mission of La Biennale de Montréal is to foster, support, interpret and disseminate the most current visual arts practices by producing the biennial event BNLMTL. All of the initiatives of La Biennale de Montréal are premised on risk and experimentation. Its goal is to support daring, thought-provoking art practices and curatorial projects while offering the public a diversity of experiences.

For more information:
Olfa Driss, Communications Director
La Biennale de Montréal