Venice Biennale Arte 2019

Addressing the question: what was our planet three billion years ago? the installation Living Rocks: A Fragment of the Universe is a South Australian collaboration by artists James Darling and Lesley Forwood, Jumpgate, composer Paul Stanhope, and the Australian String Quartet.

In Living Rocks, water floods the Magazzini del Sale, the historic stone salt storehouses of Venice that have stood the test of many an inundation. From an extensive pool emerge thrombolites that have been crafted, not by unimaginable time and the force of nature, but by the artists who employ the distinctive roots of an arid land eucalypt to create living rocks.

The installation connects the present day to the beginning of life. It is a memory of our origin and a prophesy of our future.
James Darling

Living Rocks: A Fragment of the Universe has been selected as one of only 21 official collateral events of the Biennale Arte 2019 in Venice.

Curator

Dr Lisa Slade

Official Collateral Event
  • Biennale d'Arte