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Opening reserved for accredited journalists.

Opening ceremony of the XIIIth edition of the Florence Biennale in the presence of Eugenio Giani, President of the Tuscany Region; Dario Nardella, Mayor of Florence; Cecilia Del Re, Councillor for Tourism, Trade Fairs and Congresses, UNESCO Management Plan;  Pasquale Celona, President of Florence Biennale; Piero Celona, Vice President of Florence Biennale; Lorenzo Becattini President of Firenze Fiera; Umberto Cabini, President of Fondazione ADI; Fortunato D'Amico, Curator of Cavaniglia Pavilion and Fondazione Pistoletto Città dell'Arte; Jacopo Celona, Director of Florence Biennale.

QIAF is one of the largest art festivals in Qatar. The city of Doha has fast been becoming a place where plethora of art related activities take place every year. It has become a privilege for an artist to be in Qatar. Here one can get amazing opportunities to exhibit their skills and add a few feathers of recognition in their plume.

Ioanna Lioutsia is a PhD researcher on performance art in Balkans and works as an actress and director. She has presented many performances in festivals in Greece, Italy, Germany, Bosnia Herzegovina etc. There are two main goals in her artwork: intimacy and tenderness. With everyday materials and texts from various contexts she tries to build a world where people will not feel persecuted, a world of security and trust. She draws her inspiration from lived experiences, her own or others’. Through these, she tries to redefine the position of a woman of her generation in the world as it is now, while she endeavours for a dialogue between the personal experience and the collective. She has been awarded with the 2nd prize in Playwriting Contest of State Theatre of N. Aegean for her first play (2014), while her following play “First we take Manhattan, then we take Berlin” was shortlisted at Theatertreffen Berliner Festspiele 2019.

Ioanna Lioutsia's performance will be held in the exhibition spaces throughout the day.

In the presence of Umberto Cabini, President of Fondazione ADI Collezione Compasso d'Oro and Gianfranco Tonti, ADI delegate for relations with Confindustria.

Cultural highlight of the 13th Florence Biennale for the design sector, the exhibition is curated by ADI Associazione per il Disegno Industriale through the ADI Tuscany Delegation. It brings to the attention of visitors some of the excellence of Made in Italy, through the narration and display of products, both recent and historical, that have entered the Historical Collection of the Compasso d'Oro, the most famous Italian design award. The products in the Collection are recognised as cultural assets "of exceptional artistic and historical interest" by the Ministry of Culture. On display are the excellences representing the know-how expressed by the 13 territorial delegations that make up ADI and a special focus on Tuscan design. The initiative is configured as an expression of a widespread museum that highlights the vitality of the country's production chains and as a place to tell the story of the ADI Design Museum, inaugurated last May in Milan.

Since 1956, ADI has been bringing together and representing designers, companies, researchers, teachers, critics and journalists around the themes of design. It is a key player in the development of industrial design as a cultural and economic phenomenon and, through the work of 13 territorial delegations, it maps out the Italian design system and its evolution. Since 1958, ADI has promoted and organised the Compasso d'Oro Award, the oldest award in the sector. The Fondazione Collezione ADI Compasso d'Oro, set up in 2001, has as one of its aims the enhancement, promotion and preservation of the Historical Collection, whose works bear witness to the excellence, diachronically understood, of Italian design.
 

The project involves a circular space on the stalls of
about 9 meters in diameter, where 12 "boulders" will be placed showing 12 poems by 12 poetesses. They will be composed volumetrically with white wrapping paper of about 150 x 100 cm. cad., written by me by hand in red, and positioned in a circular way, as if they were hours that mark the "time". In the centrality, connective / visual nucleus and fifth dialoguing with the "boulders", will be placed one of my works entitled "the wood of innocences" (270 x 300 x 60 cm). This artifact is composed of various wood essences with 100 trunks / branches with a radius of 5/6 cm, contaminated with shiny blood red paint, leaving it percolating at the upper ends. A sort of reference to
the "violence" against forest and forest disfigurements in the world, an ineluctable heritage of humanity. They will be allocated on special ferrous bases and subsequently covered, for the area concerned, by ashes and pitch black.

On October 23, the day of the inauguration, the site- specific installation will be the subject of a "performative" moment, where 12 poetesses, dressed in a white "fleece" with a "tear" at the mouth, and barefoot, slowly walking in a group, they will each stand stable at the foot of each "boulder" with their respective Lyric written, placing themselves in a circle, like a sort of "talking menhir" witnesses of the "written" verb. Positioned, after a brief moment of silence, to catch the attention of the "users", they will begin to recite, at the touch of a Tibetan bell, rhythmically following their lyrics. Always distance yourself between one and the other by a moment of "breathing". At the end of the verb, standing silently
and motionless, they will wait about 1 minute, before composing themselves, and returning from where they came from.

A workshop organised by Sara Del Bene that emphasises the creative process of making art. Participants do not need to have experience in the artistic field or a specific interest in contemporary art. The workshop is open to anyone who wants to explore the concept of creative energy. The public is invited to take part in a purely creative exercise. The workshop group will thus participate in a collective performance that will complement the Florence Biennale exhibition.

The installation has been designed in detail to give a precise tactile, visual and kinaesthetic sensation. Inspired by sacred geometries, perfection and perpetual change. This installation makes interactivity visible. By dialoguing with the installation we rediscover the creative action that is in each of us. The XIIIth edition of the Florence Biennale focuses on the polychrome and multiform universe of femininity.

Female empowerment, as described by the Women's Legacy manifesto, unleashes energy, the will to do, the energy to say "escort him that I may not".
It ignites creative energy is a stimulus to empowerment. The proposal is to see women's empowerment through a creative workshop. The workshop is based on the performing arts innovation of contemporary artists of international calibre. The workshop thus sees creativity as a propulsive action to empowerment.

In collaboration with Eredità delle Donne

Britt Fishel and Artists is a collaborative, contemporary dance company. Under the direction of Britt Whitmoyer Fishel (USA), the company explores assimilations of the human experience, democratizing and normalizing socioeconomic, political, and identity driven conversations, anchored in intersectional feminism.

Panel discussion with the participation of the Honorable Elena Bonetti, Italian Minister for Equal Opportunities and the Family. An unprecedented dialogue between two universes that hardly meet and that, on this occasion, open a common basis on the themes of Fashion and Made in Italy. Among the other participants in the panel discussion: Mariella Milani, costume critic and authoritative expert in fashion journalism, for over 30 years the face and voice of TG2 (Italian public television), who will weave the plots of a dialogue focused on the theme of sustainable fashion and on the objectives related to gender equality that we are trying to achieve and which is still largely to be built.

The following will also speak: Benedetta Albanese, Councillor for home, work, vocational training, rights and equal opportunities, urban safety of the Municipality of Florence; Matteo Ward, CEO and co-founder of WRÅD, innovative start-up and design studio founded to generate social value, already winner of the Best of the Best RedDot Design Award and Jacopo Celona, General Director of Florence Biennale.

KARA is an artistic group born in Brescia with the aim of creating eclectic projects, melting and mixing different languages. The dialogue created is alive, growing and in search of an exchange with the viewer. The works are in fact based on a deep and indissoluble pact that is born and always lives with the public. KARA presents “Contrario di Uno”. Sometimes the “compromise” in lovebecomes the annulment of the other, the limitation of his person. The performance analyses the fact that love means to let the other be what he/she really is. A good relationship becomes a chance to share our own individuality to create something new without “cage” the partner. The performance lives on the continuous gesture sound dialogue realized by the four performers with the instruments that identify them in their being artist. On stage: Martina Bellomi, Giovanni Consoli, Francesca Cordone, Ludovico Di Meco.

Ioanna Lioutsia is a PhD researcher on performance art in Balkans and works as an actress and director. She has presented many performances in festivals in Greece, Italy, Germany, Bosnia Herzegovina etc. There are two main goals in her artwork: intimacy and tenderness. With everyday materials and texts from various contexts she tries to build a world where people will not feel persecuted, a world of security and trust. She draws her inspiration from lived experiences, her own or others’. Through these, she tries to redefine the position of a woman of her generation in the world as it is now, while she endeavours for a dialogue between the personal experience and the collective. She has been awarded with the 2nd prize in Playwriting Contest of State Theatre of N. Aegean for her first play (2014), while her following play “First we take Manhattan, then we take Berlin” was shortlisted at Theatertreffen Berliner Festspiele 2019.

Ioanna Lioutsia's performance will be held in the exhibition spaces throughout the day.

Art installation by Sara Del Bene with collective performance workshop.

The workshop emphasises the creative process of making art. Participants do not need to have experience in the artistic field or a specific interest in contemporary art. The workshop is open to anyone who wants to explore the concept of creative energy.

The public is invited to take part in a purely creative exercise. The workshop group will then participate in a collective performance that will complement the Florence Biennale exhibition. The 13th edition of Florence Biennale focuses on the polychrome and multiform universe of femininity.

In collaboration with Eredità delle Donne

Speachers: Andrea Cancellato, Director of ADI Design Museum, inaugurated last May in Milan, that promotes connections between the world of design and its manufacturing and production systems, and the worlds of architecture, science, technology, fashion, and creativity in general. A museum where the historical Compasso d'Oro Collection, the most renowned award for the Italian design - whose products have been recognized by the Ministry of Culture as "an asset of exceptional artistic and historical interest" - is the mainstay of a narrative system, able to host temporary in-depth exhibitions with a popular impact; Agnese Bossi of Orbital Cultura (Nexi Group), the Tuscany technological excellence that developed the exclusive system of ticketing of the museum, the first in Italy without a physical ticket office, that accepts only digital payments; Valentina Gensini, Scientific Manager MUS.E – Artistic Director MAD Murate Art District.
The talk is moderated by Perla Gianni Falvo, President of ADI Tuscany – Executive Board Member ADI.

Conference "Women and climate, a common regeneration" organised by Change For Planet - Youth in Action a.p.s, an association of young people for the environment.

The conference aims to analyze the figure of women and climate change, starting from the 17 Sustainable Development Goals created and designed by the United Nations to respond to global challenges.
It will examine change through Goal 13: "Acting for the climate" and the figure of women in relation to climate change, Goal 5: "Gender equality". The objective will be to understand why women are the minority-non-minority most at risk, what should be done and what is being done, what the situation is in Italy and what we can do in our daily lives.

The artist Flora Borsi, winner of the International Open Call (Photography section) in collaboration with Art Market Magazine and Lens Magazine, will sign copies of the Moleskine notebook personalised with her photographs.

Artiglieria a.p.s. is an association founded in 2020 that operates in the artistic, social and cultural field with the aim of promoting projects and ideas to enhance and innovate the Florentine art scene.
On the occasion of the Florence Biennale, the association is presenting a site-specific work curated by Marti Rotels and Niccolò Vannucchi that investigates, through a dystopian scenario, the annihilation of Nature under the destructive force of man.

The workshop emphasises the creative process of making art. Participants do not need to have experience in art or a specific interest in contemporary art. The workshop is open to anyone who wants to explore the concept of creative energy.

The public is invited to take part in a purely creative exercise. The workshop group will thus participate in a collective performance that will complement the Florence Biennale exhibition.
The installation has been designed in detail to give a precise tactile, visual and kinaesthetic sensation. Inspired by sacred geometries, perfection and perpetual change. This installation makes interactivity visible. By dialoguing with the installation we rediscover the creative action that is in each of us. The XIIIth edition of the Florence Biennale focuses on the polychrome and multiform universe of femininity.

Female empowerment, as described by the Women's Legacy manifesto, unleashes energy, the will to do, the energy to say "escort him that I may not".
It ignites creative energy is a stimulus to empowerment. The proposal is to see women's empowerment through a creative workshop. The workshop is based on the performing arts innovation of contemporary artists of international calibre. The workshop thus sees creativity as a propulsive action to empowerment.

In collaboration with Eredità delle Donne

Presentation of the International Open Call Competition born from the collaboration between Florence Biennale, Art Market Magazine and Lens Magazine, with the aim of identifying the images used for the communication campaign of the XIIIth Florence Biennale and of promoting deserving artists and their works.

The artists and photographers who participated in the competition were invited to interpret the theme of the XIIIth Florence Biennale: “Eternal Feminine | Eternal Change. Concepts of Femininity in Contemporary Art and Design”. The works of the contest winners (1 artist and
1 photographer) have been used for the communication campaign of the event (mass media, internet, outdoor advertising, etc.) and exhibited in a dedicated space within the XIIIth Florence Biennale, while the works of the finalists (15 artists and 15 photographers) are projected in rotation within the same space. The winners also receive the Guests of Honour recognition during the event.

Flora is a young fine art photographer from Hungary. She uses exquisite photo manipulation to create surreal images that are thematically focused on identity, relationships, emotions and dreams. Her immaculate technique and subtle conceptual ideas create beautiful evocations of universal emotions, from lust and desire to despair and loss. Flora at once captures the complex strength and fragility of the human psyche. She expertly visualises dark fantasies and atmospheric dreams, utilising the uncanny and clever metaphor, while unlocking what it means to think, feel, dream and express in the urban world. Her work often features the female body and she plays with hiding and revealing the eyes or face to leave
only the feminine form, exploring questions of female representation and the relationship between body and self.

In 2021 she won the First Prize (Photography) of the International Open Call Competition, organized in collaboration with “Art Market Magazine” and “Lens Magazine” and focused on the theme of the XIII Florence Biennale: “Eternal Feminine | Eternal Change. Concepts of Femininity in Contemporary Art and Design “.

Guest of Honour at the XIII Florence Biennale, her works from the “Animeyed” series, also on show in the exhibition, have been chosen as images for the coordinated communication of this edition.

Jim Tsinganos is a multi award winning Sydney based illustrator/art practitioner with over 25 years experience. He received a bachelor of design specialising in illustration from The South Australian College of Art and Education, now UniSa and worked for most of his early career using traditional techniques such as pastels and watercolour before transitioning to digital media. His illustrations have been featured in most of the international illustration awards publications and he has been in countless exhibitions, both locally and internationally, as a solo exhibitor and as part of group shows. Throughout his career he has been commissioned by a varied selection of clients that have seen his work used as postage stamps for Australia Post, airline posters for Qantas, a series of posters for Opera Australia and a limited edition commemorative coin for the Australian Mint.

In 2019 he was part of an international jury judging a children’s book illustration exhibition at the Sharjah International Children’s Book Fair and more recently he was accepted as an exhibitor at the 2021 Florence Biennale, taking out first prize in the Art section of the Open Call International Art Competition as a result.

Tamara Art Event organized by Studio Artemisia with the collaboration of De Lempicka Estate is part of the events of the XIIIth edition of the Florence Biennale. For the occasion, some of the original serigraphs of the Polish artist are exhibited beside of the finalists of the first edition of Tamara Art Award. The XIIIth Florence Biennale also hosts a conference dedicated to the great Polish artist to reveal some secrets related to her life, and to analyze her works. The great-granddaughter of the artist Mrs. Marisa Daporto de Lempicka will be the special guest of the event telling us some curiosities about this true art star of the twenties. The international Tamara Art Award is a tribute to this “Art Deco Queen”, who was also a stylist, promoter of glamour and one of the first women and artists committed to women's emancipation. The famous painting "Self-portrait in a Green Bugatti" became the painted motto of Tamara de Lempicka, understood as the affirmation of the freedom and independence of the modern woman.

The Tamara Art Award takes up the theme of the Biennale of "eternal feminine" and wants to remind Tamara de Lempicka's personality, her strong and combative character, the sensuality and charm that she knew how to conquer Paris. Moderated by the architect Margherita Blonska Ciardi.

She will receive the Award “in recognition of a revolutionary creative production that has marked the history of fashion design over the past fifty years, changing and expanding the concept of femininity, and for designing and promoting innovative campaigns with the aim of protecting life on our Mother Earth”.

Vivienne Westwood will be present at the XIII Florence Biennale together with her partner – both in private and professional life – Andreas Kronthaler. A dedicated exhibition space will retrace the main stages of her career, with particular attention to her campaigns in defense of human rights and the environment.

Michelangelo Pistoletto, exponent of the so-called “Arte povera”, will be awarded the “Lorenzo il Magnifico” Lifetime Achievement Award. Pistoletto will be awarded “for the continuity of research, conducted for over sixty years in the artistic and interdisciplinary, which has brought contributions of fundamental importance not only to the artistic disciplines but also to humanities, science, and social. An art, that of Michelangelo Pistoletto, which has initiated practices and paths of militancy around the world, in which Art is at the center of a responsible and sustainable transformation of society. These principles, on which the project of Cittadellarte is based, a non-profit organization based in Biella, which places art in direct interaction with the different sectors of society, through the implementation of programmes aimed at promoting cultural differences as a system of enrichment of individual and social values, environmental protection, the responsibility of the artist and his work towards society. Michelangelo Pistoletto is awarded for his excellent work of spreading, through the arts, demopraxia, then the active participation of citizens in the processes of design, development and management of society. Michelangelo Pistoletto is also awarded this career award for his constant contribution to the construction of dialogue between the social partners, pursued with determination, with the conviction that in order to complete the work of planetary humanization it is necessary to consider as a priority the defence of human rights, the protection of biodiversity and its habitat, the promotion of justice and peace in the world”.

On the occasion of the XIIIth Florence Biennale, Max Casacci receives the President's “Lorenzo il Magnifico” Award from the President for his "musical research of great cultural value: in his latest sound experiments he interacted with nature, investigating the universe of sounds with a phenomenological method, combining his own musical research with that of other professionals operating in the field of scientific dissemination. His activity as a musician, closely linked to environmental militancy and social commitment for a truly participatory democracy, is oriented to the profusion of sound suggestions useful for the project of the world to come ".

Discovering the new way of doing patronage. Interview with the founders of the platform to discover the artists, projects and collaborations through them.

On the occasion of the 13th Florence Biennale, Michelangelo Pistoletto and Angelo Savarese will propose the performance La bandiera del mondo 1+1 =3, which will be composed together with the works of dozens of other art militants who will animate the project set up in the Cavaniglia Pavilion, curated by Fortunato D'Amico.

Introduced and moderated by Fortunato D’Amico.

The semi-residential centers L'Abbraccio, L'Aquilone (in its articulation in two locations) and L'Arcolaio are four realities that offer answers to the needs of citizens who find themselves in conditions of severe and medium-severe disability and their relatives who very often they have to take on important and burdensome family obligations. The territories concerned are part of the south-east Florentine area, which includes the municipalities of Figline and Incisa Valdarno, Rignano sull’Arno, Reggello, Tavarnuzze, Impruneta, Barberino Tavarnelle and San Casciano.

The daily commitment of the operators is entirely oriented towards the development of the abilities of the children, each with their own particularities and needs. Despite the long experience and professionalism of the staff, the risk of not being able to overcome the stigma of diversity is always present and perhaps even more so in recent years. These four realities are the patrimony of the municipalities that have delegated their management to the Azienda USL Toscana Centro and are managed by social cooperatives through tenders.

Their participation at Florence Biennale represents an important opportunity to "bring out" the resources of people who too often struggle to find spaces other than everyday ones and who run the risk of not being recognized not only as artists but not even as citizens.

Speech by Francoise Fiquet and others on the theme of the 13th Florence Biennale, on Marguerite Yourcenar, on the environment and on LGBTQ+ issues by the Antinoo Yourcenar association (this year marks the 70th anniversary of "Memoirs of Hadrian").

The non-profit cultural association draws its primary inspiration and cultural motivation from the work, life and thought of Marguerite Yourcenar, intending to promote, enhance and protect what in Italian artistic legislation is broadly defined as the cultural heritage, through the organisation of exhibitions, evening events, conferences, artistic events, publications and any other means of disseminating and expanding the public accessibility of the heritage.

In order to recall Marguerite Yourcenar's studies and commitment about the condition of women, Stefano Mancini was asked to celebrate the 700th anniversary of Dante Alighieri's death with a reading of extracts from his book Trasumanar per verba (ed. Youcanprint 2021).

A theatrical performance by Antinoo Yourcenar will follow at 12 pm.

Legendary beauty, visionary photographer, revolutionary…  

Born in Italy in 1896, she emigrates to the U.S. where she is “discovered” by Hollywood. Unfulfilled by the roles of Femme fatale she gets, Tina becomes a jazz age bohemian and the lover of photographer Edward Weston, with whom she travels to Mexico. Tina would pursue a career as a photographer and create  images of extraordinary formal clarity and profound soulfulness. 

Tina would be torn between art and politics. It is impossible for her to photograph poverty and do nothing about it. After photographing the homeless, she feels compelled to invite them home and feed them. Her social concerns lead her to join the Communist party. The Mexican government deports her. In Moscow Tina throws her camera to the Moskva River to dedicate completely to social causes.

Tina volunteers as a nurse in the Spanish Civil War but the shock of caring for destroyed victims of carpet bombing is unbearable. After the defeat of the Spanish Republic, she returns to Mexico. Though only 45, she has aged prematurely and dies alone in a taxicab of a heart attack. In her funeral her friend PABLO NERUDA would say: “The new rose is your rose…because fire never dies.” 
 

Milanese photographer Oliviero Toscani, known worldwide for his campaigns of interest and social commitment, will receive the "Lorenzo il Magnifico" Lifetime Achievement Award "for transforming commercial advertising into a tool for social awareness, adopting a critical and ethical point of view in professional practice that has led to revolutionary breakthroughs in the treatment of communication content in the mass media. His commitment to promoting human rights, cultural and gender diversity has always been a constant throughout his work. Oliviero Toscani's civil and ethical commitment is not only in his advertising activities, but also in art exhibitions, publishing, appearances on television programmes, radio broadcasts and militant participation in humanitarian associations, including Nessuno Tocchi Caino".

The award ceremony will be followed by a talk by Oliviero Toscani, who will be available to the public for questions and curiosity.

Some photos of the photographic exhibition "Razza Umana" will be exhibited in the spaces of the Florence Biennale.

MuDeTo is a web editorial project, directly developed by a the non-profit association with the same name, including products that have been designed and produced in Tuscany. The Museum of Tuscan Design - MuDeTo is currently the only one project adopting a communication strategy and archive System aiming at: a) “acquiring” at least 8 products per year; b) publishing periodically papers from renowned design critics and researchers such as: Renato De Fusco, Alberto Bassi, Maria Cristina Tonelli and Maurizio Vitta.

This will be followed by the presentation of "The New Normal" - ISIA. 

An interactive experience created as a master thesis project and designed to be disseminated in both its digital and physical versions. A speculative concept with a deep research work behind it that starts with the Covid-19 pandemic and reaches more unspecified futures. Users are invited to make decisions, as events unfold, and experience the consequences of their choices until they arrive at their own personalised future scenario. The project aims to make people responsible and aware of the role that each person's behaviour plays within society, and on a broader scale, it aims to create a social research resulting from the different outcomes of people's choices.

The ISIA is a state university-level institute founded in 1975 and part of the AFAM - Alta Formazione Artistica e Musicale - sector of the Ministry of Education.
Its teaching model is that of a research laboratory whose main aim is to produce a constant updating of knowledge and skills that adapts design training to the changing scenarios of contemporary society.

The Executive Master in History, Design and Marketing of Jewellery intends to respond in an innovative and adequate way to the requests for growth and professional skills of the goldsmith sector, taking into account the needs of the labour market and the characteristics of the Italian industrial districts, with particular attention to goldsmith sector of the city of Arezzo, with which, in the previous editions of the master, increasingly close and actively collaborative relationships have been established.

The aim of the master is above all to train sufficiently versatile, qualified and prepared professional figures in the various development sectors of a company and therefore adaptable to the different needs of companies.

With the participation of the design academies of Tuscany, represented by: Francesca Tosi, President of the Italian University Conference of Design; Mimmo Cafasso, Director LABA; Francesco Fumelli, Director ISIA Florence; Giorgio Verdiani, Architecture Department – University of Florence; Giò Carbone, Director Lao-Scuola of Arti Orafe. With them, talking about future, Anna Rita Fioroni, President of Confcommercio Professioni, the Federation of Confcommercio-Imprese for Italy which gathers the professional associations; Anna Lapini, National President of Terziario donna Confcommercio; Pierluigi Bemporad, President of the Selfhabitat Cultura association.
The talk is moderated by Perla Gianni Falvo, President of ADI Tuscany – Executive Board Member ADI.

Curated by Cécile Angelini and Sergio Mazzoni. With Tonatiuh Ambrosetti & mvt/architectes, Marc Angeli, ANTILIA gallery, Pascale Barret, Florent Bellamy, Barbara Bergaglio, Melania Berlen, Valerio Berruti, Big Mountain County, Project Marta, Giulio Caresio, Ermanno Cavaliere, Noëlle Clou, Céline Cuvelier, Lieven De Boeck, Hannah De Corte, Gian Giacomo Della Porta, Enrico Ferrarini, Maurizio Ferraris, Michel François, Mario García Torres, Régis Gonzalez, Francesco Granieri, Ezio Gribaudo, Paola Gribaudo, Giorgio Griffa, Lotta Hannerz, Marie Hume, Paolo Inverni, Dominique Loreau, Astrid Malingreau, Gianluigi Maria Masucci, Maxime Matthys, SelçukMutlu and Lola Zefi, Nero / Alessandro Neretti, Elena Pelosi, Marie-Françoise Plissart, Barbara Polla, Paolo Robino, Fabrice Samyn, Fabrizio Santona, Alessandro Saturno, Agnès Thurnauer, David Tremlett , Fabio Viale, Dario Voltolini, Peter Wüthrich, Silvio Zamorani.

What happens when 48 artists, writers, poets, musicians and art professionals (editors, archivists, framers, curators) from all over the world are asked to create a work dedicated to artistic contamination? The idea was born in February 2020, shortly after the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic in Italy: “What if we propose an exhibition dedicated to another type of contamination?” In art, contamination is synonymous with freedom: freedom to engage in dialogue with works from the past, to create works with multiple voices, to mix heterogeneous elements; freedom not to be assigned to a fixed category. An emancipatory hybridization between artists, currents, disciplines, means and materials, that is characteristic of contemporary art. The exhibition was designed for the patients and staff of the COVID-19 Hospital housed in the “Officine GrandiRiparazioni” contemporary art museum of Turin. Two video installations were created and broadcasted in loop, simultaneously, in the “red zone” occupied by the patients, and in the “yellow zone” intended for hospital staff. The idea was to bring two worlds closer together and to create an artistic contamination between patients and doctors – who had emphasized how difficult it was not to be able to see and touch each other due to the uniforms and health measures adopted. A year later, the original and innovative contributions in the exhibition are still relevant from an artistic and societal point of view.

Presentation of the catalogue of the XIII edition of the event, edited by the Florence Biennale and Giorgio Mondadori Editore.

With Jacopo Celona, Giovanni Cordoni, Fortunato D'Amico and Carlo Motta (Giorgio Mondadori Editore).

Frida Kahlo, born in Coyoacan, Mexico in 1907 has become one of the most recognizable artists in the world and a feminist icon. As a girl, polio caused her right leg to wither, resulting in a partial amputation many years later.  Further aggravating her health was a gruesome bus accident that led to numerous operations and a life of constant pain. Frida Kahlo, who would marry famous Mexican muralist Diego Rivera, was able to create some of the most original and powerful paintings of the 20th century.
 
This fully illustrated lecture presents a kaleidoscopic portrait of Frida Kahlo.  Using over 300 slides of her paintings, and documentary photographs as well as rare film footage, this panoramic lecture reveals a multi-faceted Kahlo whose persona was deeply rooted in Mexican culture and popular art traditions.

Florence Biennale has established a partnership with WAVA – World Association of Visual Arts which enables participating artists of the XIII Florence Biennale to compete for the WAVA AWARD for "Best Artist". Winners will be chosen during the XIII Florence Biennale (Fortezza da Basso, 23-31 October 2021), upon consideration of all artworks on display, and will be announced and awarded on the occasion of the Awards Ceremony.

WAVA is an independent, nonprofit, nongovernmental, nonpolitical organization for persons from all over the world, formed under voluntary gathering for the cause of realization, protection and synchronization of the interests of its members and maintaining activities for affirmations of the true values of visual arts and institutions from all over the world which work in this field. This association operates all over the world and collaborates with international organizations, associations, foundations, and institutions. The main goals of WAVA are collaboration and connecting with all individuals, organizations and institutions in the world who deal with visual arts: painting, graphics, drawing, sculpture, conceptual art, installations, performances, photography, cartoons etc…

An opportunity to meet and discuss the issue. Gloria Marco Munuera (an artist directly involved in an episode of censorship of one of her works by Facebook) and Federico Giannini (Editor-in-Chief of Finestre sull'Arte - Rivista online d'arte antica e contemporanea) also spoke.

We invite all artists to participate and share their experience.

Britt Fishel and Artists is a collaborative, contemporary dance company. Under the direction of Britt Whitmoyer Fishel, the company explores assimilations of the human experience, democratizing and normalizing socioeconomic, political, and identity driven conversations, anchored in intersectional feminism.

An exorcism brings a young man face-to-face with a shadow self as his soul hangs in the balance. The possession exhumes issues of selfhood and identity, exploring race and gender as a multidimensional universe. Reality explodes in a crisp white Le Corbusier utopia as he grapples with the paradoxes of faith.

To show extraordinary women, engaged in their activities- past, present and future, and to honor all these individuals whose sense of purpose, unrelenting creativity and life-challenged in myriad of ways have not precluded them to move on with zest and optimism. Their unending curiosity and exciting lives will hopefully inspire younger generations and incite them to delete from their lives the words “ dread, denial and discomfort and fear “ as they also may approach the very old biological age.
Through interviews, clips and archival footage this film captures and explores the lives of four strikingly strong and zesty centenarian women who reveal to us how in spite or because of all their struggles and adversities, they have arrived to the winter of their lives with dignity and grace.

The exhibiting artists and designers who distinguish themselves with their works in the competition receive the "Lorenzo il Magnifico" International Award for Art and the "Leonardo da Vinci" International Award for Design.

The awards are assigned by an International Jury made up of leading figures in the sector.

Theatrical performance by the actor Finazzer Flory on the figure of Dante Alighieri whose 700 years since his death this year.

Sustainable architecture and environmental issues are at the centre of the international debate on the sustainability practices needed to promote the preservation of the planet. Local communities, national and international bodies, environmental and humanitarian organizations, are engaged in a close dialogue with the scientific community, and with the creative community of all arts and knowledge, engineers, architects, designers, artists, to draw up and implement sustainable projects that should allow the reduction of the greenhouse effect, the use of renewable energy and the active participation of citizens in the path of responsible change. Ecological awareness is changing all sectors of organized civil society and even the Arts and Architecture are contributing, in this interdisciplinary design process, to improve overall environmental performance and regenerate the planet.

The following have been invited to discuss the theme Giulio Ceppi, Massimo Facchinetti, Andrea Felice, Marcella Gabbiani, Daniela Pellegrini, Massimo Roj, Emmanuele Villani.
Moderator: Fortunato D'Amico