Jeremy Till, Professor of Architecture at the University of Sheffield, and his team will represent UK at this year's Biennale. Till drew together a team from Sheffield including Martyn Ware, founder member of the Human League and Heaven 17; Ian Anderson of the internationally acclaimed graphic design studio The Designers’ Republic; the cross-disciplinary art collective Encounters; and Tim Etchells (artistic director of acclaimed experimental theatre company Forced Entertainment) and photographer Hugo Glendinning.
In response to a brief that focused on issues facing Britain’s regional cities, Echo City presents Sheffield as an exemplar of post-industrial cities everywhere, and uses the city as a paradigm for discussion of their identity and renewal. Till explains:
“Sheffield acts as a vehicle to push around wider ideas about cities and their social dynamics.  In this way, it is an echo of many cities, buffeted by the social and technological forces of modernity. The exhibition has Sheffield at its heart, but is about much more than Sheffield; it is about any city.”
An “urban catalogue” will be assembled in the four side rooms of the Pavilion, the composition of light, sound and images in each room reflecting urban experience at a  particular architectural and social scale; either 1:1, 1:100, 1:10,000 or 1:10,000,000. The central room is a dynamic interactive space in which visitors will be able to create their own version of Sheffield – an Echo City.

Date:

10 September - 19 November 2006

Venue:    Venice

Giardini della Biennale

Information:

Press Office Biennale, tel. 041 5218846