Gareth Kennedy mixes elements of art, architecture, performance and design. His practice concerns itself with the confluence of ideas of the modern and the vernacular. He ventures to build vulnerability into his works through their often temporary nature and through a commitment to making works which also function as an interface with everyday situations.

Gareth Kennedy's project for Venice draws on the situation of the contemporary art world at the 53rd International Art Exhibition, the mainstream cultural capital associated with music from Ireland and the import of the Neapolitan busker in Visconti's film of Thomas Mann's Death in Venice. He transplants buskers (street musicians) firstly from Dublin city centre into aspiring civic spaces within the Dublin's transforming docklands and subsequently, invites them to recreate their performances in Venice.

Against the prevailing macro-economic backdrop, Kennedy assesses busking as a micro-economic and socio-economic act. He speculates on the architecture and ambitions of these settings and their respective and concomitant relationships to artists, acknowledging how certain economic and social transactions are deemed a vital part of some cities, while in others they are unwanted or illegal. It is a work about values, and what gets valued.