Art & The Polis, the theme of the 10th Edition

Art & The Polis, the theme of the 10th Edition - FB

CustomWidgetTemplate

Art & The Polis, the theme of the 10th Edition

Announcing the 10th Edition of the Florence Biennale: Art & The Polis

The myth of the ideal city, the legacy of classical culture, is renewed in Leonardo Bruni's Laudatio florentinae urbis and in the treatises of Leon Battista Alberti, who wrote his De Pictura in 15th-century Florence, where the Platonic city of philosophers was being rebuilt. The dialogue between the arts all rekindled then reverberates, from time to time, in illuminating testimonies that are nourishment for today.

In the city that owes its name to the ludi florales in honour of Flora, the goddess of all flowers, it is Michelangelo's David that reaffirms the link between art and polis, giving voice to Giambologna's Giant of the Apennines at Pratolino and calling upon a series of other urban presences, most recently Michelangelo Pistoletto's sculpture Dietro-front that presides over Porta Romana. From this perspective, the polis should be understood not only as an environment, but as a microcosm of balance between ‘man and nature’. And as a privileged setting in which, every two years, the Fortezza da Basso becomes a ‘city of artists’. Therefore, an ideal contemporary city where talents from all over the world bring prestige to Florence. Novice, emerging or established artists, all engaged in experimenting with forms, materials and techniques with an ever-increasing awareness of their craft.

From this year, for its 10th edition, the Florence Biennale also welcomes artists working in the fields of textile & fibre, jewellery, and ceramics. They will have their own section on the stage of the Florence Biennale Internazionale d'Arte Contemporanea, sparking up a dialogue with history that is brought to life in their own making. Weaving, forming, ornamenting: we go back to the beginnings of civilisation, from Lascaux to Mycenae, while at the same time honouring the memory of a civitas like Florence, where the ‘arts’ were powerful and determined the fate of the community; a community that today, as then, is animated by ideals of harmony and beauty.

On reflection, now that even the Heideggerian echo of the ‘post-modern’ has faded, one would like to go beyond the notions of neo-avant-garde or other irreducible labels and propose a change inspired by Laurentian renovatio, Michelangelo's revolutionary canons and Leonardo's art that absorbs and reifies reality by translating it into the ‘world universe’ as theorised, years later, by Giovan Battista Vico.

FB

Language Selector