They say it makes no reference to the people who died or what can be done to prevent such tragedies in the future. It's merely something to be gawped at by the curious as they wonder if it's time for lunch.
Visitors oblivious to what happened on the boat were taking selfies in front of it and tweeting pictures of the adjacent café.
The artist, Christoph Büchel, argues that Barca Nostra (Our Boat) is "a relic of a human tragedy but also a monument to contemporary migration". He says the vessel has become a symbolic object, representing the victims of global turmoil and also the policies that create such wrecks.
That's as may be, but I don't think a "symbolic object" amounts to a work of art. To my mind, art has to trigger some emotional or intellectual reaction in the viewer. An empty boat stripped of any context isn't art but a mere object to be casually glanced at.
If an empty boat is a work of art, then so is my garden shed. Perhaps I could have submitted it to the Biennale as a "symbolic object" representing sweating gardeners and hard-working shed-builders. I can see it now, drawing the rapt attention of fascinated art critics.
Seriously though, if Christoph Büchel was really horrified by such a massive loss of human life, he could have found a better way of turning it into art. Like Picasso's Guernica. Or Lichenstein's Whaam! Or Käthe Kollwitz's War. They have an immediate and powerful emotional impact.
A lot more impact than an empty boat.
