Venice Biennial Brings Fine Art to the Beach

It will be a museum on the boardwalk this weekend when the Venice Beach Biennial opens with over 50 fine artists from around the country joining familiar local faces to exhibit paintings, sculptures and other artwork.

Beginning Friday, the event will feature site-specific installations, live performances and vending stands with wares for sale. Its goal is to showcase original creations over commercial vendors and highlight the history of free expression for which the Venice strand is world famous. 

According to its curators, the VBB takes artists accustomed to showing in galleries and museums "out of their comfort zone, and encourages them to consider their work in a new context."

Veteran boardwalk artists, whose work is regularly on display, will be featured alongside nationally recognized figures like Barbara Kruger and Matthias Merkel Hess. Artists may also collaborate with shop owners and restaurateurs to present site-specific projects, interventions, murals, and wall projects.

Among the works on display:

Carter Mull will set up a photo booth on the boardwalk in which visitors may have their photo taken in the manner of obituary photographs.

Drew Heitzler and Sam Sharit will debut a new video animation in an Ocean Front Walk tattoo parlor.

Jennifer Rochlin will present ceramic tiles inserted into recesses on the facade of the public restrooms.

Albert Culbertson and Indira Burgos make paintings and boxes with imagery burned into wood using a magnifying glass and sunlight.

RA Superstar shows vibrant paintings mixing abstract expressionism and Pop Art.

Works will be presented on the boardwalk proper as well as in the Recreation and Parks area near Windward Plaza.

VBB is presented in conjunction with Made in L.A. 2012 and directed by the curator of the Hammer Museum, Ali Subotnick. The event runs through Sunday. Admission is free.