Image courtesy of La Biennale di Venezia
By Art Contributors
Liliya Tippetts & Nataliia Shpytkovska
The 59th International Art Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia, titled The Milk of Dreams, will open to the public from Saturday April 23 to Sunday November 27, 2022, at the Giardini and the Arsenale; it will be curated by Cecilia Alemani and organised by La Biennale di Venezia chaired by Roberto Cicutto. The pre-opening will take place on April 20, 21 and 22; the awards ceremony and inauguration will be held on 23 April 2022. In 2021, La Biennale di Venezia launched a plan to reconsider all of its activities in light of recognized and consolidated principles of environmental sustainability.
La Biennale and Carbon Neutrality
For the year 2022, the goal is to extend the achievement of “carbon neutrality” certification, which was obtained in 2021 for the 78th Venice International Film Festival, to all of La Biennale’s scheduled activities, which include the 59th International Art Exhibition, the Theatre, Music and Dance Festivals and the 79th Venice International Film Festival.
THE INTERNATIONAL EXHIBITION
The Exhibition will take place in the Central Pavilion (Giardini) and in the Arsenale, including 213 artists from 58 countries; 180 of these are participating for the first time in the International Exhibition. 1,433 the works and objects on display, 80 new projects are conceived specifically for the Biennale Arte.
“The Milk of Dreams takes its title from a book by Leonora Carrington (1917–2011)” - Cecilia Alemani stated - “in which the Surrealist artist describes a magical world where life is constantly re-envisioned through the prism of the imagination. It is a world where everyone can change, be transformed, become something or someone else.”
The exhibition The Milk of Dreams takes Leonora Carrington’s otherworldly creatures, along with other figures of transformation, as companions on an imaginary journey through the metamorphoses of bodies and definitions of the human.
The exhibition not only implies the urgency of transformation, but timely reflects the great shift and social change taking place we over the past years and what is further accelerating by the global events unfolding and movements unfolding in the real world and meraverse.
This exhibition is also grounded in many conversations with artists held in the last few years. The questions that kept emerging from these dialogues seem to capture this moment in history when the very survival of the species is threatened, but also to sum up many other inquiries that pervade the sciences, arts, and myths of our time.
How is the definition of the human changing? What constitutes life, and what differentiates plant and animal, human and non-human? What are our responsibilities towards the planet, other people, and other life forms? And what would life look like without us? These are some of the guiding questions for this edition of the Biennale Arte, which focuses on three thematic areas in particular: the representation of bodies and their metamorphoses; the relationship between individuals and technologies; the connection between bodies and the Earth.”
The 59th International Art Exhibition was also made possible thanks to the support of Swatch, Partner of the event. Main Sponsor of the 59th Exhibition is illycaffè. The event takes place in clise collaboration with Ministero della Cultura, the regional Institutions that each in their own way support La Biennale, the City of Venice, the Regione Veneto, the Soprintendenza Archeologia, belle arti e paesaggio per il Comune di Venezia e Laguna, and the Italian Navy.
www.labiennale.org #BiennaleArte2022 #IlLatteDeiSogni #TheMilkOfDreams
Comments