Larnaca Biennale

Larnaca Biennale 2020 grapples with limits.

That which is definable inevitably grapples with the question of limits. What is really there is in essence the area it takes up, either tangible or intangible, real or imaginary.

Limits change, expand, shift; but they cannot be annulled because then what they define would be annulled too.In this paradoxical age of utter deconstruction, of a single globalized society, of a single device, a single social model, such notion could sound provocative, perhaps because we often confuse challenging limits with challenging their very existence. The first could be the definition of freedom, the second is a rather superficial version of it.

To claim that there are no limits is equivalent to shouting at the top of your lungs to someone standing right in front of you: “To me you do not exist!” But to address someone means to acknowledge they exist.

Creative thinking has always trodden along the border but also, quite often, beyond the limits. The scientist whose vision took him outside the limits of his era; the poet in quest of the impossible; the artist defending to death the unproven – they do not fight to abolish limits; they fight to change them.

For humanity, this is the fulcrum of progress.Are there spaces that do not negotiate their limits? Are there limits in nature or is this a socially constructed notion? Can something exist beyond limits forever or merely for some time? And if yes, at what cost?In the end, are there any limits?There are, but they are limitless.

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Vassilis Vassiliades , Curator , Larnaca Biennale 2020