Renowned Turkish contemporary artist Nil Yalter, alongside Brazilian artist Anna Maria Maiolino, has received the Golden Lion for lifetime achievement from the Venice Biennale for their enduring influence and significant contributions to contemporary art.
Renowned Turkish contemporary artist Nil Yalter, alongside Brazilian artist Anna Maria Maiolino, has received the Golden Lion for lifetime achievement from the Venice Biennale. This prestigious award recognizes their lasting impact and substantial contributions to the field of contemporary art. The 60th edition of the biennale, themed “Foreigners Everywhere,” will honor both artists during the opening ceremony on April 20, 2024.
According to the statement of the Venize Biennale, “This decision is particularly meaningful given the title and framework of my Exhibition, focused as it is on artists who have travelled and migrated between North and South, Europe and beyond, and vice versa. In this sense, my choice rests upon two extraordinary, pioneering women artists who are also migrants and who embody in many ways the spirit of Stranieri Ovunque—Foreigners Everywhere: Anna Maria Maiolino (Scalea, Italy, 1942, lives in São Paulo, Brazil), who migrated from Italy to South America, first to Venezuela and later to Brazil, where she lives today; Nil Yalter (Cairo, Egypt, 1938, lives in Paris, France), a Turkish who migrated from Cairo to Istanbul and finally to Paris, where she is based.”
Maiolino was born in Italy, was raised in Venezuela, and is now based in Brazil; Yalter was born in Egypt, attended art school in Turkey, and now lives in France. Both octogenarians will appear in Pedrosa’s exhibition, which opens in April.
“This decision is particularly meaningful given the title and framework of my Exhibition, focused as it is on artists who have traveled and migrated between North and South, Europe and beyond, and vice versa,” Pedrosa said.
The works of Yalter and Maiolino
Though best-known today for large-scale sculptures formed from clay and cement, Maiolino began making conceptual artworks and films during the ’60s and ’70s that count among the most important works produced in Latin America during the era. Her “Mental Maps” series, from the ’70s and resembling diagrams with text attempting to chart relationships between herself and others, are among her most famous pieces. Other works by her are more explicitly critical of the political state of Brazil.
Yalter’s films, installations, and conceptual artworks have tested gender norms and crossed national borders. In ways both provocative and understated, Yalter has shown that identity is flexible and mutable, and often subject to changes depending on where a person is and how they present themselves to the world. Often, her focus has been people whose communities have not always been visible to the mainstream—Turkish immigrants living in France, in one famed work, and an 18th-century French diplomat who remade himself as a woman, for one classic video.
Both artists will make their debut at the Biennale Arte in 2024. Anna Maria Maiolino is set to unveil a new expansive work, extending her ongoing series of sculptures and clay installations. Meanwhile, Nil Yalter will present a fresh reinterpretation of her groundbreaking installation, “Exile is a hard job,” in collaboration with her iconic piece, “Topak Ev,” positioned in the initial space of the Central Pavilion at the Giardini.