The Exhibition “Looking ahead. The evolution of the art of making. 9 stories from Veneto: digital – not only digital.” in the Venice Pavilion, returns to its origins, with an exhibition on contemporary Applied Arts. The Venice Pavilion at the 2015 Biennale, based on technology and knowledge deriving from experience, manual skills and creativity, gives rise to new development opportunities. The theme of the exhibition, in fact, is based on the ” relationship between technology, creation, creativity and forms” and on the reflection, which is as relevant as ever, on the creative contribution offered by digital tools.
The Pavilion was also dedicated to the Applied Arts in the past. Towards the most recent applications of advanced technology. We wonder whether the progress of technology, and in particular the spread of digital technology, is leading us towards horizons of standardization and uniformity, or whether on the contrary it offers new opportunities for development, for creative diversification and hence for experimentation with new forms.
To be more specific, we wonder whether the progress of technology, and in particular of digital technology, is proceeding towards its designated fate of celibacy and a growing banality of forms, or whether on the contrary, the marriage of experience and technology, of handcrafting, understood as the direct application of man and his expertise, and the solutions that this very technology has made it possible to invent, is more fertile than ever.
La Biennale wishes to explore this phenomenon, and it does so in an initiative that explores the theme of “digital – not only digital”, with the intent to examine those specific instances in which the two Muses, the Muse of technology and the Muse of knowledge born of experience, together can generate significant phenomena in the evolution of forms. La Biennale is taking its first step in this direction. This is a field of research to which it intends to dedicate part of its energies in the future. We will start by observing the reality that surrounds us.
To explore the phenomena that have developed most recently in the Veneto region. Our intention is to broaden our outlook in the future. We are in the process of establishing relationships with important international institutions. It is no easy task to represent this state of affairs in an exhibition; these are results, but they are also stories which led to those results, the complexity of which cannot be ignored. This phenomenon raises and inspires many questions, and for this reason we have chosen, in the autumn, to organize an event that will offer an opportunity for reflection and debate with leading national and international experts.
In conclusion, while in a certain sense it may be seen as a return to the past of the Venice Pavilion, in other ways and in the light of its contents, this choice may be considered to be the cornerstone of a building we are beginning to construct, an area of research that we intend to develop: we are fully convinced that this initiative responds to the demands and interests that are arising from society and from industry, which are grappling with radical yet inevitable change, and that la Biennale, whose mission is to explore the “form” given to the creations of man in many different sectors, for which the issues being raised here may well be pertinent, cannot ignore.
“Looking ahead. The evolution of the art of making. 9 stories from Veneto: Digital – not only digital” starts from an awareness of the importance of the creative approach to production processes and explores ongoing developments on the Italian scene, which offers many noteworthy examples. The exhibition is organised as an inquiry into the phenomenon on a local scale, beginning from the area closest to the Biennale venue, and describes creative processes which, from an inspired idea, have developed in often tortuous ways, involving experimentation, risks, errors, illusions and purposeful and casual encounters before finally producing results acknowledged for their intrinsic quality and originality.
The research not only sets out to highlight formal and production results that stem from various synergies but also aims to describe the pathways taken. In this it will explore the methods, organisational modes and “craft” relations underlying the creation of products and therefore also the new elements and experiences that contribute to forming the professional creative and artistic figures involved. The relocation of business on a world scale, artistic creativity and technologies can be brought together to solve the dilemma between what is now pointless to produce here and what can only be produced here.
Using various media, the exhibition illustrates the modes in which these processes have developed. To mention only a few examples, they range from how state-of-the-art products have been made using techniques from the past; the design of live-saving equipment; the possibility of combining social networks and production, or of being the sole producers of everyday functional objects. The exhibition is also enhanced by the views of people from various parts of the world. These mainly leading designers, top-level researchers and sophisticated customers have found the best producers here. They have chosen to work with our local creatives and producers, acknowledging the special nature of their “art of making”.
Venice Biennale 2015
The 2015 Art Biennale closes a sort of trilogy that began with the exhibition curated by Bice Curiger in 2011, Illuminations, and continued with the Encyclopedic Palace of Massimiliano Gioni (2013). With All The World’s Futures, La Biennale continues its research on useful references for making aesthetic judgments on contemporary art, a “critical” issue after the end of the avant-garde and “non-art” art.
Through the exhibition curated by Okwui Enwezor, La Biennale returns to observe the relationship between art and the development of human, social and political reality, in the pressing of external forces and phenomena: the ways in which, that is, the tensions of the external world solicit the sensitivities, the vital and expressive energies of the artists, their desires, the motions of the soul (their inner song ).
La Biennale di Venezia was founded in 1895. Paolo Baratta has been its President since 2008, and before that from 1998 to 2001. La Biennale, who stands at the forefront of research and promotion of new contemporary art trends, organizes exhibitions, festivals and researches in all its specific sectors: Arts (1895), Architecture (1980), Cinema (1932), Dance (1999), Music (1930), and Theatre (1934). Its activities are documented at the Historical Archives of Contemporary Arts (ASAC) that recently has been completely renovated.
The relationship with the local community has been strengthened through Educational activities and guided visits, with the participation of a growing number of schools from the Veneto region and beyond. This spreads the creativity on the new generation (3,000 teachers and 30,000 pupils involved in 2014). These activities have been supported by the Venice Chamber of Commerce. A cooperation with Universities and research institutes making special tours and stays at the exhibitions has also been established. In the three years from 2012-2014, 227 universities (79 Italian and 148 international) have joined the Biennale Sessions project.
In all sectors there have been more research and production opportunities addressed to the younger generation of artists, directly in contact with renowned teachers; this has become more systematic and continuous through the international project Biennale College, now running in the Dance, Theatre, Music, and Cinema sections.