At a beautiful 16th century palace in the heart of Venice, the melancholic sounds of strings and the words of Robert Burns' The Slave's Lament drift from room to room and out onto the glittering waters of the Grand Canal.

The sound of the Scottish lament, filtered through dub reggae, classical strings and the art of one of Scotland's leading contemporary artists, lingers over the sounds of water taxis on the churning canals of the Italian city.

The official Scotland +Venice show at the world's biggest visual art festival, the Venice Biennale, was opened to the press today.

Fagen's show contemplates the Burns own life, his art, and the history of slavery and empire, aptly in a city that was formerly one of the maritime and mercantile powers of Western Europe.

The Biennale is the stage for dozens of countries to display the contemporary art talent of their times and Scotland, officially a "collateral event" at this 56th International Art Exhibition, is showing the work of Glasgow based artist Graham Fagen.

Amid the finery of terrazzo flooring, Murano glass chandeliers and grandeur of the Palazzo Fontana, Fagen has filled four rooms with sculptures, paintings, and, in the final room, a video and music work in collaboration with a team of fellow artists.

In the show, staged by Hospitalfield Arts of Arbroath, Fagen has recast Burns' 1792 song with Scottish composer Sally Beamish, the voice of reggae artist Ghetto Priest, and noted 'dub' music producer Adrian Sherwood, and musicians from the Scottish Ensemble.

On four video screens, images of the artists play in pin-sharp video while the sound, expertly produced and mixed by Sherwood, resonates around the four hundred year old room.

The show is inspired by that Burns song but also the poet's life - in 1786 he booked a passage to Jamaica, where he would have been an overseer of slaves.

However the bard changed his mind, perhaps influenced by the success of his first book.

This version of the Slaves Lament was recorded in the City Halls in Glasgow, and mixed and produced by Sherwood at his studios in Ramsgate, Kent.

The music of the Burns' song drifts into the other exhibition rooms.

In the entrance hall, a magnificent space with two chandeliers, stands the most physically impressive piece, Rope Tree.

The four and a half metre tall tree, formed from rope but cast from bronze, splays its metal arms across the room.

The impressive tree, fashioned from 1o seperate sections, was made by Powderhall Bronze of Edinburgh.

The rope, a reference to the architectural maritime detail found both in Venice and Hospitalfield, also points to the history of slavery which Burns song references.

The poem and song are not certain to have been written by Burns, but they are often attributed to the national bard, with lines sung from the point of view of a slave: 'It was in sweet Senegal that my foes did me enthral/For the lands of Virginia,-ginia, O/Torn from that lovely shore, and must never see it more/And alas! I am weary, weary O.'

Fagen said he was inspired to centre the show on the song as he was intrigued not only by reggae but by Burns nearly moving to work in Jamaica in 1786.

Fagen has said: "I went to school in Irvine and each January we recited off by heart a Burns poem or song, and as I grew up in school I developed a curiously in punk and reggae music.

"I suppose I started addressing that curiosity when I discovered that Burns had booked passage to go and work in Jamaica, and that fact of history gave me not only a historical but a conceptual bridge to that part of history.

"And at school we were never told that Burns was ready to go and work on a plantation."

In two further rooms, Fagen has made pictures and sculptures, entitled Scheme for Lament and Scheme for our Nature.

Scheme for our Nature features sculptures adorned with casts and moulds of Fagen's hands, face and teeth in clay and ceramics coated in metallic lustre.

The faces resemble death masks, and are like three dimensional takes on Scheme for Lament, a picture gallery hung with a series of ghostly self portraits spattered in colourful Indian ink.

Outside a neon sign welcomes visitors, Entra nel Giardino, E dimentica la Guerra, it says: Come into the Garden, and forget about the war.

The text was found by Fagen ona Flemish war memorial.

The Palazzo Fontana is being used as a Biennale venue for the first time.

It was built by pupils of leading Renaissance architect Jacopo Sansovino and was the birth place of Pope Clemens XIII in the late 17th century.

It occupies more than 4,000 square feet.

The new venue also accommodates 21 students and recent art graduates in a 'learning team' selected from seven art and design colleges from across Scotland.

The national pavilions of the UK, and countries such as France and Germany, will open to the press tomorrow at the main Giardini (gardens) site.

Scotland + Venice at the Venice Biennale runs from May 9 to November 22