Simone Fattal: “Art Is Its Own Form Of Activism”

“The pearl trade was one of the largest industries connecting the Orient and Europe” artist and poet Simone Fattal says, “and with it came politics, community and a legacy we can still see in Venice today.” Fattal is describing the context for her latest artwork, the installation Sempre il mare, uomo libero, amerai! (Free man, you’ll love the ocean endlessly!) shown at Ocean Space’s exhibition Thus waves come in pairs — its name taken from Fattal’s former partner Etel Adnan’s poem Sea and Fog — in the imposing venetian church San Lorenzo run by the arts foundation TBA-21. The piece features an assembly of pink, oversized pearl-like sculptures scattered across the ancient floor of the church and is shown alongside Petrit Halilaj & Álvaro Urbano’s installation Lunar Ensemble for Uprising Seas.

These life sized pearls have been a long time coming for Fattal. When she was asked by TBA-21 Academy to create a work that responded to the theme of the ocean, the brief conjured thoughts of Fattal’s that had been resurfacing about the Arabic trade of the Silk Road, and her own time living in the Middle East. Fattal was born and raised in Damascus, Syria, and later moved to Beirut before leaving during the Lebanese Civil War. With a free pass from TBA-21 Academy and a specific theme on her mind, she began creating an assemblage that would address the concept of the ocean through Arabic pearl routes.

The historic space of San Lorenzo offered a good backdrop to the ideas Fattal had been having herself over division and reunification in the Middle East. “One part of the church historically was used for the public and the other was for nuns, so this idea of duality was always there” Fattal explains of the space in Venice. “Ocean Space is committed to the sea, so I started thinking of pearl diving, and the pearl industry between the Middle East and Venice. In 19th Century Qatar there were two competing companies that used to manage all pearl diving and commerce, this pearl trade route reached to Venice – pearls were sold here, with Venice being at the end of the silk road.”

Fattal has a background in publishing and is “always reading”. At the time of creating the installation she was re-reading Baudelaire’s The Man and the Sea and took the name from Sempre il mare, uomo libero, amerai! from his book. “Baudelaire has been with me for a very long time” she says. There was one quote that I was thinking of that was in my mind while I worked on this” she says “it’s the line ‘sea, no one knows the riches of your keep, so jealously you guard your secrets.’”

“When I was asked to take part in this project I was immediately interested. San Lorenzo is one of the most unusual churches in Venice” Fattal says, “It was a convent for a long time and is less typically ornate than other local churches.” Fattal’s work occupies one half of San Lorenzo church, with the other half hosting artists Petrit Halilaj & Álvaro Urbano’s installation Lunar Ensemble for Uprising Seas – an assemblage of fictional metal wildlife. Both works were brought to Ocean Space by Venice-based curator Barbara Casavecchia.

Inspired by Baudelaire’s words, Fattal engraved the pearls with texts in a version of lingua franca – “a language that was a mixture of Italian, Arabic and Greek so those along the silk road could communicate.” The pearls are a nice nod to the glassy glamour of the pearl industry, and the politics between the Middle East and Europe. Next to the work, two clay figures and a sculpture reminiscent of Venice’s mooring wooden poles flank the pearls, spectres that jar against the scattered pearl assemblage. Fattal describes the sculptures as “the Islamic figures Máyya and Ghaylán,” who each had ships in the pearl trade and would often compete with each other for fiscal success. Despite this link, the physical connection within the church walls feels unclear. Halilaj and Urbano’s work rises to the occasion of San Lorenzo’s cavernous architecture, whilst Sempre il mare, uomo libero, amerai!, feels lost in the space.

Ocean Space was founded in 2019 by the TBA21 Academy – the research offshoot of the art foundation TBA21 led by Francesca Thyssen-Bornemisza, to encourage “ocean literacy” through art. “Art is its own form of activism, art is how we understand history, and where that history has brought us to today” Fattal says — “With San Lorenzo, I wanted to bring the history of Venice into the church to confront the audience.”

Thus waves come in pairs runs until 5 November 2023 at Ocean Space, San Lorenzo, Venice.