The Saudi Pavilion at the 59th International Art Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia presented the artist Muhannad Shono. Shono (has) duly created The Teaching Tree, a large-scale installation covered in dried and painted palm fronds and animated by pneumatics. The ambiguous form pierced through the length of the space and intermittently expanded and contracted as if breathing. This work emerged from the artist’s investigation of the line and its dichotomous potential for both creation and destruction.
Shono’s practice was driven by his rejection of rigidity and his questioning of truths and ontologies as embodied in the power of the line, the impact of writing and generation of thought. Mark and line making is fundamental to this: from his graphic novels and early illustrations to more recent robotic installations, the act of leaving a mark on any given surface is an act of exercising agency in creating and recreating. Shono embraced ambiguity and the use of the line as a tool for creativity. In The Teaching Tree, Shono built upon the fundamental impulse of his practice, responding to personal experience, tradition, mythology and the natural world with his exploration of the line and its (re)generative potentialities.
Shono was inspired by the figure of Al Khidr to investigate life cycles and the power of nature and regeneration. Much like this figure, The Teaching Tree grows no matter the conditions in which it finds itself. These references have created an imaginative practice that reclaimed and depicted the line in a way that gave it power to become anew, to flourish, and to grow.
Linking the creative spirit to the power of nature, The Teaching Tree alluded to nature as it writhed, fighting for its survival, and ushering in hope for rebirth and new beginnings. Shono’s artwork also transmitted a message of wisdom and the promise of regeneration. The tree has grown as a statement of resilience in the face of the forces that attempted to limit its span.
Commissioner: Visual Arts Commission
