Venice 2013 - Arsenale: 55th
International Art Biennale; National Pavilions – Holy See. The Holy See
participates this year for the first time at la Biennale di Venezia with a Pavilion inspired by the biblical
narratives in the Book of Genesis. In
Principio (In the Beginning) is the title chosen by the commissioner,
Cardinal Gianfranco Ravasi, who has promoted and designed this absolute novelty
in line with the Dicastery’s mission of promoting dialogue with contemporary
culture. The first eleven chapters of
Genesis have been the incipit
for reflection, coordinated by the curator, Prof. Antonio Paolucci, Director of
the Vatican Museums. From here they proceeded to identify three nuclei, these
are Creation, Un-Creation and Re-Creation, entrusted to the three international
renowned artists who have constructed different routes that communicate between
each other. As an opening, though, of the Pavilion on show a sort of “trilogy”
of the works of Tano Festa, a Roman artist who long worked on Michelangelo’s
Sistine Chapel: the figure of Adam from the scene of Creation on the vault, the
figure of the devil-serpent in the scene of the Original Sin, and the face of
Adam, a sort of sign inviting the visitor to view the new works.
Holy See: Studio Azzurro - The Creation. The Creation has been given to Studio Azzurro.
By a thoughtful use of new media, the famous Milanese group has risen to the
challenge with an interactive installation that sees the human person at the center
and stimulates the observer into mental and physical-sensorial movement within
the surrounding space and individual and collective memory.
Holy See: Studio Azzurro - The Creation. Immaterial images come to life when touched
by the hands of visitors, suggesting the animal kingdoms, through the gestures
of the deaf and dumb, and the dominion of the spoken word.
Holy See: Studio Azzurro - The Creation. Human beings
are seen as “bringers of stories”, of personal narrations that come together
through multimedia languages to form a great story of origins of the relation
between man and time. These are the
voices, faces and gestures living in an enclosed condition under space and
language, telling stories: male and female prisoners from Milano-Bollate retell
their genealogies in an identity building process that moves backwards as far
as memory stretches.
Holy See: Josef Koudelka –
Un-creation. For Un-creation the Czech photographer Josef Koudelka was chosen:
the power of his panoramic black and white photographs tells of the opposition
of man to the world and to moral and natural laws, and material destruction
deriving from the loss of ethical meaning.
Holy See: Lawrence Carroll - Re-Creation. The hope
present in the Re-Creation
is expressed through the art of Lawrence Carroll: his ability to give new life
to materials, turning them through processes of rethought and regeneration,
opening up new possibilities of coexistence between apparently opposing
dimensions, such as fragility and monumentality. The installation has the title
Another Life and is composed of four great wall paintings and a floor piece.
Lucy and Lawrence Carroll
Holy See: Lawrence Carroll - Re-Creation. Untitled (Freezing Painting), 2013, ice, oil
wax, canvas on wood. A group of technicians was involved in realizing this
piece, a freezing painting, unique in its kind for the characteristics and
dimensions with respect to his previous works.
It cyclically will melt and refreeze modifying its aspects over the
course of the day.
Above: Lucy cleans the condensation
off the glass.
Seen in the Holy See Pavilion, Ben
Jakober, Olimpia Fischetti, Gianfranco D’Amato, Yannick Vu and Massimo
Moschini.
Holy See: Lawrence Carroll - Re-Creation.
Seen in the
Holy See Pavilion, Lucy Carroll, Angela and Rosita Missoni and Lawrence Carroll.
Seen in the
Holy See Pavilion Raphael Castoriano promotes the Marina Abramovic Institute -
Run/Walk in Hudson, N.Y. on September 21.