Florentina Holzinger Opens Austrian Pavilion With 25 Daily Performers

Florentina Holzinger started the final rehearsal day for florentina holzinger’s Austrian contribution, Seaworld Venice, just as Venice Biennale visitors were already crowding the Giardini. She climbed by rope into the bell hanging at the pavilion portal and struck it hard, turning the rehearsal finale into the opening gesture for a pavilion that will not behave like a normal exhibition.

Seaworld Venice in Vienna's pavilion

25 performers are scheduled to use the Hofmann Pavilion area from the following Saturday until 22 November, appearing daily and naked. That shifts the Austrian contribution away from a static display and into a long daily performance run, with the pavilion itself functioning as the stage rather than the container for one.

The official opening of the Austrian pavilion was scheduled for the day of publication, so Holzinger’s bell strike landed at the edge of the Biennale’s public start. A human striking device produced the sound at the rehearsal finale, a small mechanical detail that matched the production’s broader insistence on bodies, labor, and repetition.

Giardini crowds and Biennale disputes

The preview day drew many visitors to the Giardini, giving Holzinger’s work an unusually immediate audience before the pavilion even opened. The Biennale itself was already carrying wider controversy: Russia participated for the first time since the start of the war of aggression against Ukraine, while the international jury resigned at the height of the disputes surrounding the event.

Pietrangelo Buttafuoco, the president of the Biennale foundation, sits behind that broader institution, but Holzinger’s pavilion is the sharper story for anyone tracking what this edition asks of visitors. A daily live installation with 25 naked performers is a much heavier use of the Austrian space than a conventional national display, and it will reward anyone willing to return, not just pass through once.