Simon Mordant @ The National Press Club

1 April 2015

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Australia has had representation at the Venice Biennale since 1954 and the list of artists is a formidable collection of our best and brightest visual artists as well as representation at the Venice Architecture Biennale.  2015 will see Fiona Hall as the featured artist but more importantly the new Australian Pavilion will be opened after a lengthy but exacting process to promulgate, process and choose the design, then to build what will be the first 21st century building in the Giardini della Biennale, replacing the ‘temporary’ Philip Cox designed pavilion built in 1988

Simon Mordant is the Australian Commissioner for the 2015 Venice Biennale, among a swag of other things including as a board member of the ABC. He can gather a crowd too and they came from all over Australia to hear him address the National Press Club and learn of the process to build this new pavilion largely with backing from Mordant and his wife Catriona. He is the kind of man who makes things happen, the new pavilion is testament to that, and gathering together this impressive group of Australians involved in and working with our diverse cultural and artistic landscape across a wide spectrum made the politics of Canberra look decidedly dull, colourless and boring.