venice BIENNALE 2007
Callum Morton’s Valhalla, Australian Pavilion
Callum Morton
Valhalla 2007
Steel, polystyrene, epoxy resin, silicon, marble, glass, wood, acrylic paint,
lights, sound, motor
465x1475x850cm
Palazzo Zenobio, Venice Biennale 2007. Courtesy the artist, Roslyn Oxley9
Gallery, Sydney and Anna Schwartz Gallery, Melbourne
Callum Morton
Valhalla 2007
Steel, polystyrene, epoxy resin, silicon, marble, glass, wood, acrylic paint,
lights, sound, motor
465x1475x850cm
Palazzo Zenobio, Venice Biennale 2007. Courtesy the artist, Roslyn Oxley9
Gallery, Sydney and Anna Schwartz Gallery, Melbourne
In the quiet sunny gardens of the Palazzo Zenobio
in the Dorsoduro district, amid the flowers, grass and wooden benches, there
is an ugly structure that would have looked more at home amid the bombed
buildings of a Beirut street. Callum Morton’s sculpture Valhalla has
the presence of a war-torn ruin, but is a careful reconstruction of the
house his architect father built in 1974 – ‘a concrete homage
to Mondrian’. Morton adds his own pock marks, cracks, empty windows
to create something more ghostly. You are invited to go through the door
in one side, inside which you find a pristine re-creation of a lift lobby.
A glum attendant or cleaner [this one was reading a book], sat and ignored
whoever comes in. Press one of the lift buttons and the deep rumbling of
a mechanical lift getting into action echoed behind the façade, but
the doors will never open.
Callum Morton’s Valhalla is at the Australian Pavilion, Palazzo Zenobio, Dorsoduro 2596, Venice
TATE ETC. at the Venice Biennale 2007:
Franz
West
Richard Deacon
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