Respiro, an installation by the influential conceptualartist Sarkis (b.1938, Caylak Sokak, Istanbul. Lives and works in Paris) will be on view in the Pavilion of Turkey at the 56th International Art Exhibition, la Biennale di Venezia from 9 May through 22 November 2015. Curated by Defne Ayas (Director of Witte de With Center for Contemporary Art), the Pavilion of Turkey is organised by the Istanbul Foundation for Culture and Arts (İKSV), and is located at Sale d’Armi, Arsenale, in the main venue of the biennale. The inauguration of the Pavilion of Turkey will be held at 14.30 on Thursday, 7May.

​The installation consists of two site-specific neon rainbows and two large-scale mirrors with fingerprints applied in watercolour by seven children—named Abay, Anna, Aren, Helin, Karla, Claudia and Linda—together with several of his iconic sculptures and thirty-six stainedglass panes featuring the artist’s photographs and found images. Respiro is complemented by a musical composition by Jacopo Baboni-Schilingi based on the Sarkis’s rendering of the rainbow’s seven colours as a system of partitions.The music is played day and night, together with the neon works breathing in and out for the duration of the exhibition. Respiro took its first breath on 3 April and became fully alive on 23 April 2015.