Something big is happening here

SARAH MILROY

MONTREAL -- At the launch of the Montreal Biennale 10 days ago, about an hour into an afternoon symposium, I had an epiphany about the Biennale's curator, Wayne Baerwaldt.There, in a light and airy former classroom of the abandoned schoolhouse-turned- temporary-museum (the École Bourget on rue de la Montagne), 100 or so artists, curators, writers and art collectors were gathered with the ostensible aim of discussing the topic of borders. Soon, though, the proceedings began to take a less strictly choreographed shape. At Baerwaldt's prompting, the artists were asked to stand and simply talk about the work they were showing. There was a lot of rambling, to be sure, but the rambling was interspersed with occasional flashes of brilliance. An overall sense prevailed of the creative process taking its own meandering time to unfold.