VENICE, ITALY.- The artists representing Scotland at the 51st Venice Biennale, the world’s most important showcase for contemporary art, are Alex Pollard, Cathy Wilkes, and Joanne Tatham and Tom O’Sullivan. In a project entitled Selective Memory, curators Jason E Bowman and Rachel Bradley seek to encourage the public to explore the notion of artistic labour and the process of making art.

All artists are based in Glasgow and have exhibited internationally (for examples of their work see www.scotlandandvenice.com. Alex Pollard’s work focuses on systems of communication; his exhibition will develop his recent work using cut-up and customised antique articulated rulers, transforming them to create objects that form structures and ways of communicating with the viewer. Cathy Wilkes’ work is informed by feminism; she produces sculpture, paints and writes as well as creating detailed installations that combine each of these elements.

Selective Memory follows the highly acclaimed Zenomap exhibition in 2003, the first presentation of contemporary art from Scotland undertaken by the Scottish Arts Council and British Council, which featured work by Claire Barclay, Jim Lambie and Simon Starling. Scottish artists have shown work at the Venice Biennale since 1897. The Scottish artist Mark Boyle represented Britain in 1978, and since then David Mach, Arthur Watson, Kate Whiteford, Douglas Gordon, Christine Borland and Roderick Buchanan, among others, have participated. This year will be the first time that presentations from Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland are all complementing the British Pavilion at this prestigious event.