The world is currently grappling with numerous crises related to the movement and presence of individuals across various countries, nations, territories, and borders.
Dislocation and displacement, the consequence of economic migration and wars, contribute to the complexity of these crises. The struggles faced by individuals in search of safety, refuge, or a better life underscore the urgent need for understanding, empathy, and solidarity in addressing these global challenges.
These crises serve as a reflection of the risks and challenges associated with language, translation, and ethnicity, which highlight the existence of differences and inequalities influenced by aspects such as identity, nationality, race, gender, sexuality, wealth, and freedom.
Within this intricate web of intersecting factors, the phrase "Stranieri Ovunque - Foreigners Everywhere" - the central theme of the upcoming 60th International Art Exhibition in Venice, scheduled to take place from April 20th to November 24th, 2024 - takes on a profound significance.
Firstly, it conveys the idea that, regardless of one's location or situation, encounters with foreigners are inevitable - they / we are omnipresent. Secondly, it suggests that, regardless of the specific geographical location one may find themselves in, they perpetually carry within them a sense of being a foreigner.
The Biennale Arte 2024 will be curated by Brazilian Adriano Pedrosa, director of MASP, the São Paulo Museum of Art (designed by the Italian-born architect Lina Bo Bardi; Pedrosa is a fan of Lina Bo Bardi and also relaunched the display system she designed for MASP with concrete plinths on which the works of art in the museum collection were anchored).
The theme of the Biennale, "Foreigners Everywhere", is taken from a series of neon pieces started in 2004 by the Paris-born and Palermo-based collective Claire Fontaine. The neon artworks, displaying the phrase "Foreigners Everywhere" in different languages, actually hint at the work of a Turin collective, known as Stranieri Ovunque, which actively campaigned against racism and xenophobia in Italy during the early 2000s.
This year Lesley Lokko, curator of the 18th Biennale Architettura currently on in Venice, is introducing visitors to the work of African architects, artists and designers, pushing us all to confront a variety of issues, from colonialism to slavery, from the erasure of Black cultural landscapes to the concept of Black Fantastic and Afrofuturism. In the same way, the Biennale Arte 2024 will explore a variety of themes, focusing on artists who have travelled often under the most diverse circumstances, who are also immigrants, expatriates, diasporic, émigrés, exiled, and refugees, and who have moved between the Global South and the Global North, in a celebration of the foreign, the distant, the outsider, the queer, and the indigenous.
In a press release commenting about the event, Pedrosa stated, "The figure of the foreigner is associated with the stranger, the straniero, the estranho, the étranger, and thus the exhibition unfolds and focuses on the production of other related subjects: the queer artist, who has moved within different sexualities and genders, often being persecuted or outlawed; the outsider artist, who is located at the margins of the art world, much like the autodidact and the so-called folk artist; as well as the indigenous artist, frequently treated as a foreigner in their own land."
The primary focus of the Biennale will be on the production of these artists and will constitute the International Exhibition's "Nucleo Contemporaneo" (Contemporary Nucleus). But there will also be a "Nucleo Storico" (Historical Nucleus) with works from 20th century Latin America, Africa, the Arab world, and Asia. In this section there will be spaces dedicated to artists from the Global South, who travelled to Europe and were exposed to European modernism. "Modernism was appropriated, devoured and cannibalized in the Global South," Pedrosa explains, "repeatedly taking on radically new shapes and forms in dialogue with local and indigenous references.
Inside the "Nucleo Storico" a special section will also be devoted to the worldwide Italian artistic diaspora in the 20th century: Italian artists who travelled and moved abroad developing their careers in Africa, Asia, Latin America, as well as in the rest of Europe, becoming embedded in local cultures. These artists often played significant roles in the development of the narratives of modernism beyond Italy.
Next year's edition of the International Exhibition of Contemporary Art marks the 60th anniversary of the event that has been going for 128 years (the first biennale event took place in 1895). However, this milestone is further enhanced by a historic appointment: for the first time ever the exhibition will be curated by a professional hailing from a Latin American country. This historic appointment marks a significant step forward in recognizing the diverse perspectives, artistic contributions, and cultural richness that Latin America brings to the global art scene. Hopefully, the exhibition will embrace a new era of inclusivity highlighting the rich tapestry of diverse voices and experiences that exist across borders, reminding us all that our identities are not confined solely to our place of origin or residence but encompass a broader sense of being "other," of feeling unfamiliar or out of place, transcending physical boundaries.
Image credits for this post
1. Claire Fontaine, Foreigners Everywhere (Italian), 2004, installation view at Cité internationale des arts Paris, Monmartre, Paris, 2004; suspended, wall or window mounted neon, framework, electronic transformer and cables. Photo and copyright Studio Claire Fontaine; Courtesy of Claire Fontaine and Galleria T293, Rome
2. Claire Fontaine, Foreigners Everywhere (English), 2005; Tecnolux ultra violet, 10mm glass, back-painted, framework, electronic transformer, cables. Photo and Copyright Studio Claire Fontaine; Courtesy of Claire Fontaine and Galerie Neu, Berlin
3. Adriano Pedrosa. Photo Daniel Cabrel, Courtesy Museu de Arte de São Paulo
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