René Burri: Utopia

From 26 August 2016 until 8 January 2017, the rooms of this Venetian building on the Giudecca island will be hosting the exhibitions “René Burri. Utopia”, curated by Michael Koetzl.

“Utopia” by René Burri (Zurich 1933-2014) collects together for the first time over 100 images devoted to architecture by this great Swiss artist, with shots of famous buildings and portraits of architects. Burri’s photography was born from his need to recount the great transformational processes and the historical, political, and cultural changes of the twentieth century, paying close attention to certain people (his portraits of Che Guevara and Pablo Picasso are unforgettable) who were part of it. Utopia is being held at the same time as the 2016 Venice Biennale of Architecture and reflects this, inasmuch as Burri conceived of architecture as a genuine political and social operation that conveys and imposes a vision of the world; this impelled him to travel throughout Europe, the Middle East, Asia, and Latin America in the footsteps of the great twentieth century architects, from Le Corbusier to Oscar Niemeyer, Mario Botta, Renzo Piano, Tadao Ando, and Richard Meier. Apart from their portraits and their buildings, Utopia also displays images of historical events that are brimful of contrasts and hopes, such as the fall of the Berlin wall and the protests in Tiananmen Square, Beijing, in 1989.