German-Italian artist Irene Cattaneo has built a distinct sculptural language shaped by material, memory, and place. Since relocating to Venice in 2021, her practice—spanning glass, bronze, and stone—has evolved through close collaboration with local artisans. Known for her crisp forms and playful symbolism, Cattaneo brings literary references and personal narratives into dialogue with the city’s layered history, most recently through immersive installations presented during the Biennale.
Irene Cattaneo Working Between History and Ephemerality
Courtesy of Irene Cattaneo.
WHITEWALL: Venice has inspired generations of artists across centuries, how does the city speak to you personally, both creatively and emotionally?
IRENE CATTANEO: Venice is where I truly found myself—and it still has that effect every time I return. It brings me back to center while quietly urging me to go deeper, both emotionally and creatively. Its urban landscape—an island that opens onto a vast horizon – feels like a quiet parallel, a reminder of how something can be both contained and expansive at once.
WW: There’s a unique tension in Venice between history and ephemerality. How does that duality influence your way of seeing or creating?
IC: To me, history is the very expression of ephemerality—it’s time made visible. That awareness carries a quiet sense of nostalgia, along with the urge to hold onto something fleeting in the present. I often build my work around narratives from literature, cinema, and other past forms of storytelling, using them as a kind of scaffolding, so the work can exist in a suspended moment—something Venice continually evokes.
“I often build my work around narratives from literature, cinema, and other past forms of storytelling.”
-Irene Cattaneo.
WW: During the Biennale, Venice becomes a global crossroads of ideas. What kind of energy do you seek or absorb from this moment? Did maternity change it?
IC: Maternity did change everything, and this transformation inevitably found its way into my artistic practice. For this Biennale, I present my first installation as a mother, following a body of work created during pregnancy for Galerie Gastou. I created an installation around the idea of a Secret Garden—in dialogue with childhood, shifting toward its lived reality and the ongoing process of self-discovery. It also references the 1993 film *The Secret Garden*, a strong childhood memory for me, where the garden gradually emerges as a protected interior shaped by time, care, and shared experience. This frames the garden not as a decorative setting, but as a lived interior condition—where early bodily memory and emotional imprint are traced. That shift is also present in how I’m experiencing this Biennale as a visitor: more playful, open, and curious, with a renewed sense of wonder and new encounters.
Venice as Muse
Courtesy of Irene Cattaneo.
Courtesy of Irene Cattaneo.
WW: Are there particular places in Venice, hidden or iconic, that consistently spark your imagination?
IC: Da Nane, on a small fishermen’s island about 30 minutes by boat from Venice. The journey through the lagoon already feels like a passage, and arrival there is like stepping into another rhythm—this tiny island almost unreal, like a frame from a Wes Anderson film. After lunch, a swim, then a long walk along the beach, far from the tourists and crowds, in a sense of quiet that feels almost untouched.
Murano, for me, is of course its working side—from mirror makers to my glassblowing master and the bead artisans. It’s also about the direct confrontation with the artisans themselves—their gestures, their precision, and the way they perceive and understand materials, shaped by deep embodied knowledge of making. Each visit triggers new ideas and continually expands my aesthetic vocabulary, opening up new ways of seeing and making.
The antique market, held on the last Sunday of each month in Campo San Maurizio, is a concentrated pool of carefully selected Venetian objects—high quality, slightly unexpected, and full of taste and character—all gathered in a small square close to The Gritti Palace.
A walk timed to start at Basilica di Santa Maria della Salute, an historic architectural gem, then continues around the Punta with wide panoramic views of Venice, with possible art stops along the way at the Peggy Guggenheim Collection, Lo Studio di Nadja Romain, or the Punta della Dogana. The walk then ends at Zattere for a sunset drink overlooking Giudecca and Marghera. The perfect afternoon—finished with a gelato al gianduia at Gelateria Nico.
“The city becomes almost overwhelming in its density of encounters, ideas, and perceptions.”
-Irene Cattaneo.
WW: Beyond the exhibitions themselves, what are you most looking for during the Biennale experience this year?
IC: Venice during the Biennale feels like an intensified form of life, where everything is heightened and accelerated. The city becomes almost overwhelming in its density of encounters, ideas, and perceptions. It leaves its trace on those who pass through it, leading to a kind of heightened sensitivity, nervous fatigue, and overstimulation, as if the senses themselves had been stretched beyond their usual threshold. I am looking forward to all of this …
Courtesy of Irene Cattaneo.
Courtesy of Irene Cattaneo.
