Biennale Arte 2022, the Italian Pavilion to Eugenio Viola

Eugenio Viola will be the curator of the Italian Pavilion at the 59th Venice Biennale, scheduled from 23 April to 27 November 2022, under the guidance of Cecilia Alemani. This was announced by the Minister of Culture Franceschini, who underlined: "Viola is the bearer of a creative, ambitious and innovative vision, capable of thoroughly investigating the profound changes triggered by the pandemic in our society". Neapolitan, 46, Viola is currently the curator of the Mambo modern art museum in Bogota, Colombia. "For me a great honor and privilege", commented thanking the minister. "I will work to the utmost commitment, ethically, aware of the responsibility for the prestigious assignment that has been entrusted to me".In his career Viola has curated over 70 exhibitions in Italy and around the world and has to his credit more than 50 publications including books and catalogs. The project that he will propose in the large pavilion at the Tese delle Vergini of the Arsenale and which was chosen by the minister in the list proposed by the director general of Contemporary Creativity Onofrio Cutaia, is summarized as "a reflection on the urgencies of Italy today, suggesting keys to reading and above all of resolution and redemption of the current situation by creating a path ".a reflection on the urgencies of Italy today, suggesting keys for interpretation and above all for resolution and redemption of the current situation through the creation of a path ".a reflection on the urgencies of Italy today, suggesting keys for interpretation and above all for resolution and redemption of the current situation through the creation of a path ".

Prior to the experience in Colombia, Viola was Senior Curator of PICA - The Perth Institute of Contemporary Arts in Perth, Australia, as well as curator of the Madre Museum in Naples, from 2009 to 2016. Here he co-curated the first major institutional exhibitions in Italia dedicated to Boris Mikhailov and Francis Alӱs, a project by Daniel Buren and retrospectives by Vettor Pisani and Giulia Piscitelli. As guest curator he has collaborated with numerous Italian and international institutions. The ten curators invited to the selection had been expressly asked to tackle the current and urgent issues of today's society, exploring them through the transversality and interdisciplinarity typical of contemporary languages, to create worlds and imaginaries capable of constructive dialogue with the spaces of the Italian Pavilion which occupies 1200 square meters,to which 900 square meters of outdoor space are added.