When you speak about collecting one thinks of collectors, museums, foundations and institutions...What about the artists? The Festival of Contemporary Art has, since its first edition, underlined the absolute importance and primary role that artists play in contemporaneity and the system of art. This time we are called to explore not only their practice and the themes they work with, but also speaking about important projects and commissions and their own relationship with the collecting subjects.
Stories of collectors, museums and exhibition spaces that were founded and developed or ceased to exist, anecdotes and memories are the topics of these conversations with journalists, curators and members of our scientific board. First of all, Joseph Kosuth who addresses the public on his history of conceptual art till today from the motto art as idea as idea. Angela Vettesse interviews him in a enthusiastic debate that explores the work of the master in his profound theoretical and artistic complexity which had an impact, so fundamental, on artistic production from 1966 on.
Goshka Macuga and Milovan Farronato confront each other on the Polish artist's research where she collects languages, references, and different ways that look at the history of man from a unique perspective. The project presented was shortlisted for the Turner Prize and the Bloomberg Commission. The Nature of the Beast, is a impressive installation which looks at Picasso's Guernica, it is among the themes in this discussion. From a different perspective we look at the collector Mark Dion, who works by collecting objects of all types, setting up, overlapping, juxtaposing them to create new and different worlds.
Alfredo Pirri in conversation with Ludovico Pratesi, director of Centro Arti Visive Pescheria Pesaro, Maurizio Morra Greco president of the Napoletan foundation with the same name and Beatrice Merz, co-director of Castello di Rivoli offers an occasion to get to know another side of collecting: art linked to society, projects which face the pain of humanity and art which interfaces with the public system.
Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster with Angela Vettese, discusses one of her sensational projects looking at the history of the Turbine Hall entitled TH 2058. The conversation is moreover an occasion to flesh out the roots of her "bed rooms" above all the ones where the sleepers are collectors. Between Dmitry Vilensky and the protagonists of the Russian collective Chto Delat? the curator Viktor Misiano asks him to analyse, from his perspective the Russian scene and the relationship between the artist and collecting in a country still associated with an important history. Grazia Toderi is invited to a roundtable discussion which comprises of Laura Barreca, Chris Eamon and Elena Volpato to discuss New Media Art.
How does one create a collection in this sense? What are the distinctive realities along these paths? How do you combine the idea of collecting with an art form whose primary characteristics are democratisation, reproducibility and sharing? The speakers elaborate on the aforementioned topics.
(tag
Angela Vettese,
Milovan Farronato,
Castello di Rivoli,
Ludovico Pratesi,
Grazia Toderi,
Mark Dion,
Joseph Kosuth,
Beatrice Merz,
Laura Barreca,
Goshka Macuga,
Dmitry Vilensky,
Viktor Misiano,
Alfredo Pirri,
Chris Eamon,
Elena Volpato,
Maurizio Morra Greco,
Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster)
