The 58th International Art Exhibition of La Biennale Venezia, titled "May You Live In Interesting Times," a phrase of English invention long mistakenly cited as an ancient Chinese curse, will open to the public from May 11 to November 24, 2019. The pre-opening starts today. /VCG Photo

Though the title phrase has long been thought to invoke periods of uncertainty, crisis, and turmoil, Paolo Baratta, president of the Biennale di Venezia, stated that it could also be seen as an invitation to consider the course of human events in their complexity - especially in times when "too often, oversimplification seems to prevail, generated by conformism or fear." /VCG Photo

Curated by Ralph Rugoff, current director of the Hayward Gallery in London, the 58th Exhibition will include 79 artists from all over the world. The curator declined to see art as a force in the domain of politics, but rather "a kind of guide for how to live and think in 'interesting times'." /VCG Photo

According to the curator, the 58th exhibition will highlight art's social function as "embracing both pleasure and critical thinking." A focus will be placed on works of artists who pose challenges to our existing habits of thought, and inspire new ways to see objects and images, gestures and situations. /VCG Photo

The exhibition will also include 90 National Participations, with four countries participating for the first time: Ghana, Madagascar, Malaysia and Pakistan. The Dominican Republic, in addition, exhibits with its own national pavilion for the first time. /VCG Photo