The Venice Architecture Biennale Committee is responsible for the selection of the Creative Director/s and the ongoing overview of the development of the exhibition representing Australia in Venice. This year The Pool by Aileen Sage and Michelle Tabet was chosen by the Australian Institute of Architects’ Venice Biennale Committee for its ‘incisive interest in the connections between landscape, culture and architecture as observed through the frame of a singular architectural and landscape typology’.

Visitors will be transported poolside through an immersive multi-sensory experience within the new Denton Corker Marshall-designed pavilion. Light, scent, sound, reflection and perspective will create a series of perceptual illusions, bringing to Venice a suggestion of a particular Australian architectural condition. Some of Australia’s most remarkable pools – be they natural or manmade, inland or coastal, temporary or permanent – will also be profiled as part of the exhibition.

“Recognisably Australian, The Pool is joyful, celebratory and accessible,” explains Creative Directors, Aileen Sage and Michelle Tabet. “It is also a setting for the sharing of stories, tales of personal and collective struggle, of community building and transformation and refusal of the status quo. Creating a pool as the focal point in the space, the exhibition will at first seduce the senses, but it will also capture the imagination and intellect of those who choose to dive deeper, as we have throughout our research and development process.

“Through the device of the pool we have uncovered many stories and from these curated eight narratives, each about an aspect of Australian cultural identity and each shedding light on the sustainability of our social infrastructures.”

To tell these stories Sage and Tabet have selected eight prominent cultural leaders from a variety of fields including literature, science, the arts, sport and music, including Tim Flannery, Ian Thorpe, Romance was Born, Christos Tsiolkas, Anna Funder, Hetti Perkins, Dawn Fraser and Paul Kelly.

Image by Alexander Mayes Photography.

Australian Institute of Architects
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