Milan, 28 March 2024 – From 12 to 14 April 2024 (with VIP preview on Thursday 11 April), miart, the international modern and contemporary art fair organised by Fiera Milano with Intesa Sanpaolo Group as Main Sponsor and directed by Nicola Ricciardi, returns.
178 participating galleries from 28 countries, more than 1,000 works by modern masters and established contemporary artists, over 10 awards spanning prizes, acquisition funds and new commissions (with a dozen museum directors from all over the world on the jury panels), make this 28th edition an essential event for the Italian and international art community.
Two brand-new sections, conceived as time machines or gateways into other dimensions, intends to highlight the vocation of miart 2024 to further expand its geographical and temporal boundaries. This is also evoked by the title of this edition – no time no space – which adopts the words of a song by Franco Battiato, a musician, artist, and “explorer of distant worlds”.
Established, the main section of the fair, brings together some of the most important modern, contemporary and design galleries from around the globe. Nestled within it is Portal, a new section curated by Abaseh Mirvali and featuring eight small exhibitions that range from solo shows that rivisit the works of Italian artists such as Franco Mazzucchelli (ChertLüdde, Berlin) and Francesco Gennari (Ciaccia Levi, Paris -Milan / ZERO..., Milan) two projects designed to broaden the traditional horizons of miart, like the booth dedicated to Anna Boghiguian (Galleria Franco Noero, Turin) or Troy Makaza and Gresham Tapiwa Nyaude (First Floor Gallery, Harare - Victoria Falls).
Also, within Established is Timescape, a project that will be developed by miart over the next three years, that brings together works created in eras increasingly remote in time with respect to the fair’s traditional chronological offerings. The starting point in 2024 will be the early 20th century, with galleries presenting micro-exhibitions with an approach that cuts across history and disciplines. Examples of this are the stand by Galleria Gomiero (Montegrotto Terme), which offers a novel take on portrait in the field of sculpture, with works
by, among others, Medardo Rosso and Giacomo Manzù; or the booth curated by Bottegantica (Milan) dedicated to some of the key Italian figures of the 20th century, from Giacomo Balla to Umberto Boccioni, with a focus on Futurism and Aeropainting.
Emergent, the section curated by Attilia Fattori Franchini and dedicated to galleries promoting the youngest generations of artists, also returns. This year, it welcomes 23 galleries from all over the world: from Lisbon to New York, from Los Angeles to Belgrade. Again, there is an interesting mix of returning galleries – Bel Ami (Los Angeles), Sébastien Bertrand (Geneva), Sans titre (Paris) – and new entries, such as Arcadia Missa (London), ASHES/ASHES (New York), Lovay Fine Arts (Geneva) and Sweetwater (Berlin).
Within the various sections, there are many museum works to discover, like Caribbean Tea Time, a spectacular 1987 screen by David Hockney – the other editions of which are now in the most prestigious international collections, from the Tate Modern to the Metropolitan Museum – presented by Galerie Lelong & Co. (Paris - New York) or the two works by Alberto Burri exhibited by Tornabuoni Arte (Florence - Milan - Forte dei Marmi - Rome - Paris - Crans Montana), Combustione B.A. (1960) and Combustione plastica (1957), which were respectively in the 'Arte Povera' exhibition at the Centre Pompidou in Paris in 2016 and in the exhibition 'Alberto Burri and Lucio Fontana' that travelled through the United States between 1966 and 1968. Or Vivian Suter's installation for kaufmann repetto (Milan - New York), the result of the artist's decades of research into the life of the Guatemalan rainforest and already the focus of two wonderful exhibitions at Secession in Vienna and GAMeC in
Bergamo.
Numerous works have also been commissioned for the 28th edition of miart. They include a poetic and monumental swing designed and created by Francesco Arena for Galleria Raffaella Cortese (Milan) or the performance piece Thyself Agency by Luca de Leva that will transform the stand of Pinksummer (Genoa) into "a travel agency for expeditions into the unknown", presenting methods to break down behavioural automatisms.
There is also no shortage of solo shows, such as those dedicated to the paintings of Tomasz Kowalski by Dawid Radziszewski (Warsaw) and Lucy Stein by Galerie Gregor Staiger (Zurich - Milan), the sculptures of Pietro Consagra by Mucciaccia Gallery (Rome - London - Cortina d'Ampezzo - Singapore) or the ceramic works of Giosetta Fioroni by Marcorossi artecontemporanea (Milan - Verona - Turin - Pietrasanta - Rome).
Modern Art, the historical backbone of miart, will be well represented with meticulously curated exhibitions. Examples include the project "Italian Artists in the Peggy Guggenheim Collection" presented by ML fine art (Milan) featuring important works by – among others – Giorgio de Chirico, Marina Apollonio, Piero Dorazio, or a selection of post-war protagonists – such as Enrico Baj, Lucio del Pezzo and Mario Schifano – proposed by Gió Marconi (Milan) and inspired by the installation that Studio Marconi presented at Eurodomus in Turin in 1968.
And, finally, as the inauguration of the 60th International Art Exhibition of the Biennale di Venezia approaches, many galleries will honour the artists selected by curator Adriano Pedrosa. Examples are the solo show dedicated to the young painter Louis Fratino by Galerie Neu (Berlin) or the ambitious exhibition by Richard Saltoun Gallery (London - Rome), which brings three leading artists from this year’s Biennale to miart: Greta Schödl, Bertina Lopes and Xiyadie.
Galleria dello Scudo (Verona) also pays tribute to the Biennale, presenting a focus on Venetian Spatialism with works from the 1950s by artists like Emilio Vedova, Tancredi Parmeggiani, Renato Birolli and Edmondo Bacci, while ED Gallery (Piacenza) presents a selection of works that were created by Murano master glassmakers for the 1914 Biennale di Venezia, in addition to paintings and sculptures.
Further boosting the exhibition’s appeal is miartalks, a programme of live debates and conversations sponsored by Starbucks Reserve™ Roastery Milano. From Friday 12 to Sunday 14 April, the Directors of some of the most prestigious art institutions (such as Stefanie Hessler, Lorenzo Giusti, Gioia Dal Molin) will dialogue with prominent members of the worlds of music (Raphael Gualazzi, Giovanni Verrando, Nicola Sani, Lorenzo Senni),
architecture, and design (Maria Cristina Didero, Giovanna Silva, LEMONOT, among many others). The programme also features three stimulating panel discussions held at the Starbucks Reserve™ Roastery Milano (Piazza Cordusio, 3) featuring artists Francesco Arena, David Horvitz and MASBEDO.
In the framework of the Milano Art Week, a pair of other unconventional locations will be at the centre of two new collaborations: a cinema and an abandoned office.
In keeping with the theme chosen by miart for the 2024 edition, Careof, the time based media production and research centre in Milan, will organise Comete. Avanguardie di un altro sistema solare, a screening programme of artists' film works. The project, curated by Marta Bianchi and Marta Cereda in collaboration with the City of Milan.
The screenings take place inside Milan’s main movie theatre, Anteo Palazzo del Cinema. Every morning from Friday 12 to Sunday 14 April, selected works are presented from the Careof Video Archive and the municipal collections by artists such as Liliana Moro, Adrian Paci, Rä di Martino, Beatrice Marchi and Ugo La Pietra, just to name a few. Artists are also invited to host public conversations about their work, to contextualize and expand their research, transforming the movie theater in a space for dialogue and study.
The other ideal portal opening out into the city is Abbandonare il locale, the first major solo exhibition in Italy dedicated to David Horvitz. Realized in collaboration with BiM – an ambitious urban regeneration project in Milan's Bicocca district which aims to transform an iconic building by Vittorio Gregotti into a cutting-edge work destination — the show takes place inside a decommissioned office at BiM and it's curated by Nicola Ricciardi, artistic director of miart, who has selected together with Horvitz over 20 works covering almost 20 years of the artists' career. The project stems from the desire to give tangible form to the expression no time no space and mixes some of Horvitz’s historical works with new productions and found objects, to examine questions of distance between places, people and time. To make the exhibition more relevant to the location housing it, SPECIFIC, a multidisciplinary creative production workshop formed by Patrick Tuttofuoco, Nic Bello, Alessandra Pallotta, Andrea Sala and Stefano D'Amelio has developed an exhibition design and lighting project by adapting original architectural elements from the office.
Another art project created especially for miart 2024 stems from the renewed partnership with fashion brand MSGM, resulting once again in the commissioning of a site-specific work for the entrance to the exhibition. For this edition, artist Jenna Bliss (b. 1984, Yonkers, New York) – represented by the FELIX GAUDLITZ gallery (Vienna) and last year's winner of the inaugural Massimo Giorgetti Award – will welcome visitors to the exhibition with a series of screens displaying her video works. The works evoke a recent past that is now forgotten, personal and collective memories, encounters and observations of everyday life and the link with social conventions and historical contexts that challenge common assumptions and expand established narratives.
This edition’s many outside influences continue in the field of music, an area that has already been fruitfully explored in the last two editions of miart thanks to an unprecedented collaboration with SZ Sugar, a music publishing house dedicated to contemporary artistic music founded in 1907 under the name Edizioni Suvini Zerboni and part of the SugarMusic group led by Caterina Caselli and Filippo Sugar. The first edition of the SZ Sugar miart commission, an award of 5,000 euros that will be expanded further over the next two years, gave
galleries participating in the exhibition the opportunity to have their artists interpret the first page of the score of Allez Hop, a mimed story by Italo Calvino set to music by Luciano Berio. Of all the ideas and proposals evaluated by SZ Sugar, with the support of a curatorial team, the project by David Lieske (represented by Corvi-Mora, London) was judged to be the most deserving. The final work will be presented in the fair.
Prizes, acquisitions and commissions include the Fondazione Fiera Milano Acquisition Fund, established in 2012. The 100,000-euro Fund is earmarked for works of art for the Fondazione Fiera Milano collection housed in its Palazzina degli Orafi premises, which currently consists of more than 110 works. The entire collection can be viewed at www.fondazionefieramilano.it. In selecting the acquisitions, Enrico Pazzali, President of Fondazione Fiera Milano, will be assisted by an international jury chaired by Diana Bracco, a member of the Foundation's Executive Committee, and composed of Simon Castets, Director of Strategic Initiatives - LUMA, Arles, Nicolas Trembley, Director, SYZ Collection - Geneva, and Moritz Wesseler Director, Fridericianum - Kassel.
Taking place once again, will be the Herno Prize, now in its ninth year, which awards a 10,000-euro prize to the stand with the best exhibition display project; the LCA Studio Legale Prize for Emergent, worth 4,000 euros, established in 2015 as a result of the collaboration with LCA Studio Legale and intended for the gallery with the best presentation in the Emergent section; the second edition of the Fondazione Henraux Sculpture Commission for the commissioning of a work in marble; the second edition of the Orbital Cultura – Nexi Group Prize, the only miart award dedicated to photography, which chooses an artist from the Established and Portal sections to be commissioned to document a museum centre with a contribution of 10,000 euros. Creating a further bridge between the fair and the city, this year the prize is the result of the collaboration with the Milan City Council on the occasion of Milano Art Week and is dedicated to Castello Sforzesco; and the Matteo Visconti di Modrone Prize, in memory of the President of the Fonderia Artistica Battaglia, worth 10,000 euros, awarded to an artist who will be able to realise their work in the foundry, with the assistance and experience of the artisans working there.
In its first edition is the Residenza 725 Prize, worth 5.000 euros, awarded to the best presentation in the Portal section. The Rotary Club Milano Brera Prize for Contemporary Art and Young Artists – established in 2009 as the first miart award and now in its 14th edition – is confirmed too: the winner, an emerging or mid-career artist, will have their work acquired and donated to the Museo del Novecento in Milan. Also making its return is the Massimo Giorgetti Prize, now in its second edition and the result of collector Massimo Giorgetti’s desire to support young artists at the beginning of their careers by awarding a prize of 5,000 euros.
Due in part to these awards, which will hit double figures in 2024, this year’s miart will be able to count on the presence of leading international directors and curators at the fair, such as: Mohamed Almusibli, Director/Curator, Kunsthalle Basel, Basel; Simon Castets, Director, Strategic Initiatives, LUMA, Arles; Tom Eccles, Executive Director, CCS Bard & Hessel Museum of Art, New York; Tom Engels, Artistic Director, Grazer Kunstverein, Graz, and Curator, 15th Baltic Triennial, Vilnius; Amy Jones, Curator, Wysing Arts Centre, Cambridge; Rebecca Lamarche Vadel, Director, Lafayette Anticipations, Fondation des Galeries Lafayette, Paris; Letizia Ragaglia, Director, Kunstmuseum Liechtenstein, Vaduz; Fabian Schöneich, Founder and Director, CCA Berlin – Center for Contemporary Arts, Berlin; Nicolas Trembley, Director, SYZ Collection, Geneva; and Moritz Wesseler, Director, Fridericianum, Kassel, to name but a few.
Intesa Sanpaolo, main partner of miart, in the Group's Lounge, will present the exhibition "Io sono una forza del passato", curated by Luca Beatrice. A reflection on contemporary painting as a dialogue between new directions and the restoration of the classical forms of the past, which increasingly sees the adoption of the artificial and digital and the abandonment of the 'handmade'. Intesa Sanpaolo Private Banking will present its innovative and comprehensive wealth management solutions with a focus on its art advisory service, dedicated to those who consider art to be an opportunity to grow their assets in a diversified manner. The long-term relationship with miart testifies Intesa Sanpaolo Group's constant support for local and cultural development aiming to consolidate the prominence of Milan in the national and international panorama of modern and contemporary art and to provide the city with an additional driver of economic, cultural and civic growth.
There are also significant renewals of the partnerships with Maison Ruinart – underlining its commitment to the world of art and sustainability by presenting the Carte Blanche 2024 programme entitled "Conversations with Nature", an unprecedented artistic project within the Ruinart VIP Lounge that proposes a unique vision and perspective of meaningful dialogue with nature and all living beings – and with Elle Decor Italia, which will enhance the miart VIP Lounge with furnishings by Kartell and Saba.
Meanwhile, there is a new collaboration with Lotus, which will present the national preview of Emeya, the first 100% electric Hyper-GT at miart. The continuing partnership with the Italian Association of Ambassadors of Taste will strengthen the pairing of art and food, which was also a feature of the previous edition.
Interest in miart 2024 from national and – in particular – international collectors is growing significantly. This is due to ICE – the Italian Trade Agency for the promotion and expansion of Italian companies abroad, which supports the event by bringing international collectors and journalists to the exhibition.
As per every year, the connection with the city will be further strengthened by a new edition of Milano Art Week (8-14 April), an event across various locations coordinated by the City of Milan's Department of Culture, which brings together the city's main public institutions and private foundations dedicated to modern and contemporary art, with a programme of exhibitions and activities.
Taking centre stage at Milan Art Week 2024 will be, among many others: Pino Pascali's solo exhibitions at Fondazione Prada, Alessandro Mendini’s at Triennale Milano and those of Nari Ward and Chiara Camoni at Pirelli Hangar Bicocca; ITALIA 70, a project curated by Massimiliano Gioni, which will see the Fondazione Nicola Trussardi once again take over Milan with an explosion of images created by 70 artists; three coinciding openings at Museo del Novecento (Magali Reus. Off Script curated by Federico Giani, Masbedo – Ritratto di Città curated by Cloe Piccoli and VOL. XXXI: Futurism Drama curated by Edoardo Bonaspetti) and two more at Fondazione ICA Milano (the exhibitions Notizia by Erika Verzutti and La casa dentro by Formafantasma).
Lastly, it should be emphasised how many of the original contents created have been thought of as a bridge between the week of miart and the next Milano Design Week (15-21 April), creating new synergies in which art and design contaminate and intertwine with each other. A striking example is the collaboration with Fuorisalone.it, which translates, as well as in a series of thematic guides and itineraries that can be used online, also in an immersive installation in Piazza Gae Aulenti where it will be possible to attend the screening of POV, the audiovisual work created by EX. (Andrea Cassi and Michele Versaci) with Giorgio Ferrero (MYBOSSWAS) to interpret and narrate Materia Natura, the theme of Fuorisalone 2024. Another ideal point of contact between art, architecture and design is represented by TALAMO, the performance sculpture by Lemonot – the platform for architecture and performing arts founded by Sabrina Morreale and Lorenzo Perri – which will stimulate new forms of collective exchange within BASE Milano.
The 2024 edition underlines miart’s leading role in art market events, extending its thematic, spatial and temporal boundaries even further and making them more permeable while also positioning itself as a platform for observing society and its changes.
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Image Caption:
Creative Direction: @cabinet_milano
Photography: @charlieengman
Cabinet Team: Fabio Maragno, Nicola Narbone, Rossana Passalacqua, Benedetta Stefani, Francesco Valtolina
Sound: Luca Venturini @waltermagi_
