Watch a Clip of Ragnar Kjartansson's Venice Biennale Performance

To judge by word of mouth at the Venice Biennale , a universal crowd-pleaser has emerged and—surprise, surprise—it's by Ragnar Kjartansson . Four years after the artist leapt to acclaim with his Icelandic pavilion featuring him painting a friend in a Speedo every day for the length of the Biennale (copious beer consumption, attested to by heaps of bottles, helped with the repetitive tedium) he has returned to Venice again as part of Massimiliano Gioni's "The Encyclopedic Palace."

Titled "S.S. Hangover," the piece, like many of his works, combines transportingly beautiful music with drinking (or at least its aftereffects). A boat carrying professional musicians is harbored at the end of the Arsenale and multiple times an hour it sets sail for a circuit around the dock as the band plays. Spotted sitting on a grassy bank by the performance—wearing a blue-and-white striped suit and a long beard like Courbet, contentedly chewing on a piece of grass—Kjartansson said, "I'm quite happy with this one."