The 23rd Biennale of Sydney opens to the public this weekend. Over 330 artworks by over 80 participants and 400 events will be presented across the city from 12 March to 13 June 2022.  

The 23rd Biennale of Sydney, titled rīvus, meaning ‘stream’ in Latin, features new work and commissions responding  to water ecology and relationships with the natural world. Audiences will experience large-scale immersive  installations, site specific projects and living works by international participants including Kiki Smith,Sheroanawe  Hakihiiwe, John Gerrard, Jumana Emil Abboud and Ackroyd & Harvey alongside Australian participants such  as Cave Urban, Badger Bates, Clare Milledge, Julie Gough and D Harding. The list of participants extends beyond  the realm of the visual arts and includes bodies of water and their custodians around the world including Australia,  Bangladesh and Ecuador.  

The 2022 edition has been developed and realised by a Curatorium comprised of Artistic Director and Colombian  curator José Roca and co-curators Paschal Daantos Berry, Anna Davis, Hannah Donnelly and Talia Linz.  

The largest contemporary art event of its kind in Australia, the Biennale of Sydney will be open to the public from 12  March to 13 June 2022 at Art Gallery of New South Wales, Barangaroo including The Cutaway, Circular Quay, Arts and Cultural Exchange, Museum of Contemporary Art Australia, National Art School in partnership with  Artspace and Pier 2/3 at Walsh Bay Arts Precinct. 

The Curatorium said: ‘rīvus is articulated around a series of conceptual wetlands situated along waterways of the  Gadigal, Barramatagal and Cabrogal peoples. These imagined ecosystems are populated by artworks, experiments  and research, responding to our connections, and disconnections, with water. Rivers have been the ways of  communication and the givers of life for entire communities and a growing number of jurisdictions around the world  are granting rivers legal personhood rights. As we see waterways having a voice in the courtroom, we wanted to  extend this further into the public sphere with our exhibition. Many of the Biennale of Sydney participants have worked  with waterways, local and international, to share their stories and raise these important conversations.  

Participants will investigate the ecologies sustained by waterways worldwide. This can be seen in works like Marjetica  Potrč’s collaboration with Wiradjuri Elder Uncle Ray Woods which tells the story of two rivers: the Soča in Slovenia  and the Galari (Lachlan River); these works will be shown alongside Brazilian artist Caio Reisewitz mural-sized  collage, which references the aquifer under the Amazon jungle. D Harding’s exploration of ancestral waterways with  the local community has inspired a new carving work. The Australian premiere of The Great Animal Orchestra, a  major installation created by American soundscape ecologist Bernie Krause and United Visual Artists, will immerse  audiences in the sounds of vulnerable habitats in Africa, North America, the Pacific Ocean and the Amazon River,  whilst French artist Marguerite Humeau will present a new sculptural commission envisioning a world in which mass  extinction has accelerated to a point of no return.’ 

Barbara Moore, Chief Executive Officer, Biennale of Sydney said: ‘This year’s Biennale is going to feel great to  experience. The city will be vibrant with artworks and events that invite everyone to come together and connect with  each other, celebrating the participants and their stories and honouring the diversity of thoughts and ideas that  empower us all. We are thrilled to unveil these incredible works and encourage visitors to flow between the venues,  to see and feel different perspectives on our connections with waterways and each other.’ 

NSW Minister for the Arts, Ben Franklin said: ‘The Biennale of Sydney is always a highlight in the city’s cultural  calendar and the NSW Government is delighted to support such a timely exhibition. We’re excited to welcome visitors  to Sydney to experience the 23rd edition which features an impressive line-up of international and local participants  from over 30 countries around the world, putting NSW artistic excellence front and centre on the world stage.’ 

RĪVUS HIGHLIGHTS 

Marking the first time this space has been used as a venue for the Biennale of Sydney, works presented at  Barangaroo including The Cutaway include:  

• Irish artist John Gerrard, best known for his sculptures and installations which typically take the form of  digital simulations, presents Leaf Work (Derrigimlagh) (2020). Displayed on a monumental 6 m x 6 m LED  wall set into a polished mirrored pavilion on Barangaroo headland, Gerrard has taken digital technology  usually employed by the commercial gaming industry to create virtual worlds that simulate extremely detailed  and authentic landscapes. Presenting a single female figure clad from head to toe in green Irish spring leaves  who slowly walks in a circle upon an empty landscape, Leaf Work animates the stress felt by the environment  in a response to the escalating climate crisis.  
• Cave Urban, a Sydney-based multidisciplinary studio formed by artists, architects and designers, presents Flows, one of the largest bamboo structures ever produced in Australia. The site-specific, immersive  installation is the largest project Cave Urban has ever undertaken and is inspired by the flow of a river.  Spanning 600 square metres the work weaves throughout the expanse of The Cutaway moving between  and around the architecture and hovering above the other artworks. 
• The Australian premiere of The Great Animal Orchestra, a major immersive installation created by  American soundscape ecologist Bernie Krause and London-based collective United Visual Artists.  Presented in partnership with Fondation Cartier pour l’art contemporain, this powerful environmentally  focused work draws from Bernie Krause’s archive of recordings with a soundscape of 15,000 animal species recorded over the last 50 years from both terrestrial and marine natural habitats. Krause’s unparalleled  research is a rare insight into the unseen world of animals. It reveals the beauty and the intricacy of animal  vocalisations, which are now in danger of being silenced by human activity. The immersive soundscape  comes to life with visualisations, created by United Visual Artists, of each animal’s contributions to the  ‘orchestra’ in vulnerable habitats in Africa, North America, the Pacific Ocean and the Amazonas (Amazon  River).

• Mata Aho Collective, a collaboration between four Māori women, presents He Toka Tū Moana | She’s a  Rock, a woven installation responding to the architecture of The Cutaway. The work references the meeting  place of fresh and salt water and is inspired by traditional Māori strapping systems called Kawe. 
• D Harding, a descendant of the Bidjara, Ghungalu and Garingbal peoples, has collaborated on a  participatory project with their community and family in Woorabinda, exploring ancestral waterways. This  project has culminated in a mapping carving by Harding presented at The Cutaway. 
• Mexican artist Tania Candiani presents a hanging sculptural sound installation hovering in The Cutaway  space. The sculpture appears as branches, symbolising waterway patterns, with pre-Hispanic wind  instruments and tiny speakers emitting sounds of Australian migratory birds. 

At the Museum of Contemporary Art Australia works reflect on deep time, primal waters, and ancient histories. 

• American artist Kiki Smith presents a series of large-scale tapestries exploring themes of climate change  and climate justice, and vulnerability of certain species. 
• French artist Tabita Rezaire based in French Guiana, presents Mamelles Ancestrales, drawing inspiration  from the megalithic landscapes of Senegal and The Gambia, space debris, archaeology, astronomy,  numerology, theology and African understandings of the cosmos. Displayed on a large floor-based screen  surrounded by a circle of stones, the film is the result of the artist’s research and expeditions to ancestral  sites.  
• Venezuelan artist Milton Becerra presents an installation with three large stones held in space by a network  of thread. These threads are the structural elements holding the stones, which appear to levitate as central  points within the mass of energy. The lines that radiate from them simulate orbits that create vibrations and  subtle sounds.  
• Slovenian artist and architect Marjetica Potrč presents a new work, The House of Agreement Between  Humans and the Earth, a structure that looks at the relationship between humans and the natural world. This  is presented alongside her signature wall drawings telling the rights of two rivers: the River Soča in Slovenia  and the Galari (Lachlan River) on Wiradjuri Country in Australia, facilitated by conversations with Wiradjuri  Elder Uncle Ray Woods and academic and filmmaker, Bernard Sullivan.  
• Alongside the artworks, a 365-million-year-old fish fossil from Canowindra NSW is displayed to the public for  the first time.  

At the Art Gallery of New South Wales, works deal with ideas around rewilding and caring for Country.  

• Barkandji elder Badger Bates presents a monumental wallpaper work in the entrance of the Art Gallery  based on one of his linocuts of Lake Menindee, depicting the fish kills of the drying lake, reminding us of a  shared responsibility for Country.  
• English duo Ackroyd & Harvey have researched native Australian grasses and ethnobotany to create a new  series of large-scale photographic prints on grass. The resulting works are living portraits of Australian environmental activist, Lille Madden and her grandfather, Gadigal Elder, Uncle Charles (Chicka) Madden.  These portraits will eventually fade, in a poignant call-to-action addressing the climate crisis.

• The 23rd Biennale of Sydney posthumously presents one of Naziha Mestaoui’s most recognised projects,  One Beat, One Tree, which debuted during the United Nations Climate Conference in 2015. Using video mapping techniques and movement tracking, audiences plant a virtual tree and encourage it to grow with  their body movement. A real tree will be planted for each virtual one. 

The Biennale returns to Pier 2/3 for the first time in 10 years, after its major redevelopment as part of Walsh Bay  Arts Precinct. Many of the works respond to “briny” environments, where saltwater meets freshwater, with highlights  including:  

• Trawlwoolway artist Julie Gough has been working with the First Nations Collections and 3D Digitisation  teams at the Australian Museum and has brougth together one hundred 3D printed replicas of Tasmanian  stone tools from the Australian Museum Collection that have been held off-Country in Sydney. The stone  tools are connected to sites along rivers and tributaries that Gough has been exploring by kayak. 
• Casino Wake Up Time, a collective of Indigenous women in Northern NSW working in traditional Bundjalung  weaving, present a suspended installation that explores stories of removal.  
• Torres Strait 8, a collective on the frontlines of advocacy for the climate crisis in Torres Strait, participate  with a hybrid art-as-protest piece featuring campaign materials created as part of the Our Islands Our Home  Campaign. The collective’s participation in the Biennale continues to magnify the campaign fighting for justice  for the communities of Zenadh Kes in holding the Australian Government accountable on climate change  policy.  
• British-Finnish artist, composer and performer Hanna Tuulikki presents a new video work looking at the  mythical beings known as selkies, singing a piece she has composed to explore multispecies communication. 
• Australian artist Clare Milledge presents a new large-scale immersive installation, taking inspiration from an  old Irish tale of the forming of a river. The installation encompasses painting, water, plants, sculpture, writing  and sound.  

At the National Art School, presented in partnership with Artspace, works explore ideas around still and stagnant  waters, as well as submerged and re-emerging histories.  

• Colombian artist Carolina Caycedo presents a large-scale mural of satellite photographs depicting the  progressive devastation on the Magdalena River caused by the El Quimbo Dam, as well as sculptures,  textiles and drawings that speak to the political agency of waterways.  
• Filipino artist Cian Dayrit presents a new embroidered textile piece created in collaboration with local  practitioners, speaking out against dam projects and the impacts of privatisation of common natural  resources. 
• The Myall Creek Gathering Cloak comes out of a contemporary revitalisation of traditional possum skin  cloak making for healing, cultural renewal and reclamation. The Cloak shows the songlines of Gomeroi  people from Boggabilla to Glen Innes and is a collaborative work made by local First Nations Community  including Elders, descendants of survivors of the Myall Creek massacre, and members of the Friends of  Myall Creek Memorial.
• English artist Joey Holder transforms the chapel space, taking audiences on an aquatic journey to an  undiscovered deep sea brine lake and the strange, shapeshifting creatures that live there. 

At Arts and Cultural Exchange in Parramatta, Manila-based artist Leeroy New, famously known for creating Lady  Gaga’s “muscle dress” presents a site-specific work, using recycled, organic and industrial materials wrapping around  the façade of the building. The form is based on the organic root formations of the iconic Balete tree of Southeast  Asia. 

The full list of participants as part of the 23rd Biennale of Sydney (2022) are: 

• A4C Arts for the Commons (Ecuador / Italy) 
• Jumana Emil Abboud (Palestine / England) 
• Ackroyd & Harvey (England / Italy) 
• Alta Tecnología Andina (Peru) 
• Robert Andrew (Yawuru / Australia) 
• Atrato River (Colombia) 
• Baaka River (Australia) 
• Ana Barboza and Rafael Freyre (Peru) 
• Badger Bates (Barkandji / Australia) 
• Milton Becerra (Venezuela / France) 
• Will Benedict (USA / France) 
• Birrarung / Yarra River (Australia) 
• Dineo Seshee Bopape (South Africa) 
• Boral River (Bangladesh) 
• Burramatta River (Australia) 
• Hera Büyüktaşçıyan (Turkey) 
• Tania Candiani (Mexico) 
• Canowindra Fish Fossil (Australia) 
• Yoan Capote (Cuba) 
• Casino Wake Up Time (Bundjalung, Kamillaroi / Australia) 
• Cave Urban (Australia; Chile / Australia) 
• Carolina Caycedo (Colombia / USA) 
• Alex Cerveny (Brazil) 
• Erin Coates (Australia) 
• Cian Dayrit (Philippines) 
• Melissa Dubbin & Aaron S. Davidson (USA) 
• Matias Duville (Argentina) 
• Dyarubbin/Hawkesbury River Placenames (Australia) 
• Clemencia Echeverri (Colombia) 
• Embassy of the North Sea (Netherlands North Sea / The Netherlands) 
• Virgile Flores (France) 
• Nicole Foreshew (Wiradjuri / Australia) 
• Jessie French (Australia) 
• John Gerrard (Ireland / Austria) 
• Alexandra Daisy Ginsberg (England) 
• Juliana Góngora Rojas (Colombia) 
• Julie Gough (Trawlwoolway / Australia) 
• Senior Craftsman Rex Greeno and son Dean Greeno (Palawa / Australia) 
• David Haines & Joyce Hinterding (England; Australia / Australia) 
• Sheroanawe Hakihiiwe (Yanomami, Venezuela) 
• D Harding (Bidjara, Ghungalu, Garingbal / Australia) 
• Joey Holder (England) 
• Marguerite Humeau (France / England)
• Iltja Ntjarra (Many Hands) Art Centre (Mparntwe / Australia) 
• Aluaiy Kaumakan (Paiwan Nation, Paridrayan Community / Taiwan) 
• John Kelly and Rena Shein (Dunghutti / Australia; South Africa / Australia) 
• Pushpa Kumari (India) 
• Eva L’Hoest (Belgium) 
• Latent Community (Albania / Greece) 
• Living Seawalls (Australia) 
• Julia Lohmann (Germany / Finland) 
• Gail Mabo (Meriam Mir / Australia) 
• Qavavau Manumie (Nunavut / Canada) 
• Nuwandjali Marawili (Yolŋu / Australia) 
• Martuwarra River (Australia) 
• Mata Aho Collective (Te Atiawa ki Whakarongotai, Ngāti Toa Rangatira, Ngāti Awa, Ngāi Tūhoe, Ngāti  Pūkeko, Ngāti Ranginui, Ngāi Te Rangi, Rangitāne, Ngāti Kahungungu ki Wairarapa / Aotearoa New  Zealand) 
• Naziha Mestaoui (Belgium) 
• Clare Milledge (Australia) 
• Yuko Mohri (Japan) 
• Moogahlin Performing Arts with Aanmitaagzi Big Medicine Studio (Murrawarri, Biripi / Australia; Ojibway,  Mohawk, Mi’kmaq / Canada) 
• Napo River (Ecuador) 
• National Committee of the Friends of Myall Creek Memorial and local First Nations Communities (on  Gamilaroi/ Gamilarray/ Gomeroi Country / Australia) 
• Leeroy New (Philippines) 
• New Landscapes Institute (Joni Taylor, Ben Blakebrough, M.A.C Studio + Ant Farm) (South Africa;  Australia; USA / Australia / USA) 
• Wura-Natasha Ogunji (Nigeria / USA) 
• Mike Parr (Australia) 
• Outi Pieski (Sámi / Finland) 
• Marjetica Potrč with Ray Woods (Slovenia; Wiradjuri / Australia) 
• Caio Reisewitz (Brazil) 
• Tabita Rezaire (France / French Guiana) 
• Duke Riley (USA) 
• Abel Rodríguez (Mogaje Guihu) (Muinane, Nonuya / Colombia) 
• Teho Ropeyarn (Angkamuthi, Yadhaykana / Australia) 
• Diana Scherer (Germany / The Netherlands) 
• Kiki Smith (USA) 
• Paula de Solminihac (Chile) 
• STARTTS (NSW Service for the Treatment and Rehabilitation of Torture and Trauma Survivors) and Jiva  Parthipan (Australia) 
• Jenna Sutela (Finland / Germany) 
• Imhathai Suwatthanasilp (Thailand) 
• The Great Animal Orchestra – Bernie Krause and United Visual Artists (USA; England) • Leanne Tobin (Dharug / Australia) 
• Barthélémy Toguo (Cameroon / France) 
• Sopolemalama Filipe Tohi (Tonga / Aotearoa New Zealand) 
• Torres Strait 8 (Zenadh Kes / Australia) 
• Hanna Tuulikki (England / Finland / Scotland) 
• Vilcabamba River (Ecuador) 
• Gal Weinstein (Israel) 
• Zheng Bo (Bai / China)

For all of the 94 days of the exhibition, the projects and ideas will be activated and explored through an expansive  program of events and experiences, titled The Waterhouse, including the return of school programs. Anchored at  The Cutaway at Barangaroo, the public program conceived by Lleah Smith, Curator of Programs and Learning, in  conversation with the Curatorium, will activate the city through daily programming for all ages and abilities. 

Exhibition entry is free. The 23rd Biennale of Sydney will be open to the public from Saturday, 12 March to Monday,  13 June 2022.  

For further information on the Biennale of Sydney, please visit biennaleofsydney.art. 

Featured image : Jose Roca Biennale Rivus Artistic Director. All photos by Ben Apfelbaum