Venice Biennale 2017: Off-Site Exhibitions Defy Easy Categorization

The 2017 Venice Biennale's off-site exhibitions present a diverse array of shows that resist simple classification. Damien Hirst's 'Treasures from the Wreck of the Unbelievable' at Palazzo Grassi and Punta della Dogana (Fondation Pinault) uses a thin fiction of an ancient shipwreck to display countless objects, feeling like a department store. More compelling fictions include Stephen Chambers's 'The Court of Redonda' at Ca' Dandolo, featuring 101 portraits of a utopian Caribbean artist society, and Gosha Ostretsov's 'I've Been Abducted Hundreds of Times' at Palazzo Nani Bernardo, blending abduction narratives with artifacts. The 'domestic palace' type is exemplified by 'Intuition' at Palazzo Fortuny, mixing Mariano Fortuny's traces with works from ancient Indus Valley boat to Kimsooja's participatory sound installation. 'The Glastress' at Palazzo Franchetti, curated by Adriano Merengo, commissions contemporary artists to create glass works with Murano artisans, including Ai Weiwei's white chandelier and Charles Avery's fish stalls. The symbiotic collective exhibition 'The Boat is Leaking. The Captain Lied' at Fondazione Prada's Ca' Corner della Regina, by Anna Viebrock, Alexander Kluge, and Thomas Demand, weaves films, sets, and images into a temporal labyrinth exploring Germany's postwar past. Douglas Gordon's elusive video installation 'Gente di Palermo!' in the Doge's Palace prisons shows a helium dolphin balloon floating in the Capuchin Catacombs in Palermo.