Artissima presents its new digital project: Foundations

From June 5 to July 5, 2020, Artissima presents its new digital interaction project, Fondamenta. It will be available online at artissima.art, and aims to experiment with new ways of meeting and communicating in response to current transformations.

The title of the project refers to the question of what is the core of a fair: the galleries, true foundations of a verticality and horizontality on which all the actors of the system move. Fondamenta brings together in one place fair, galleries, curators, collectors, works, artists; it is a collective project signed by the curatorial team of Artissima 2020 and realized with the galleries and for the galleries.

It is presented as a survey of contemporary art research, aimed at offering free of charge to the fair’s galleries new opportunities for visibility, sales and contact with the art public.

Through a simple and intuitive interface, Fondamenta presents 194 works, one for each gallery, on virtual pages imagined as ideal load-bearing walls. Each wall corresponds to a section: Present Future, curated by Ilaria Gianni and Fernanda Brenner; Back to the Future, curated by Lorenzo Giusti and Mouna Mekouar; Drawings, curated by Letizia Ragaglia and Bettina Steinbrügge; New Entries, curated by Valerio Del Baglivo; and Main Section, on this occasion curated by Ilaria Bonacossa.

Working in constant dialogue, the curators have selected an artist for each gallery, with different criteria each time, starting from their own individual choices, passions and research, but with a single shared point: the proposed works have a maximum price of 15 thousand euros. The objective is to build a proposal that is also useful to approach a new, young audience, creating new contacts between collectors and galleries. All under the banner of high quality.

“Investigating contemporary art and discovering trends, shared themes, obsessions or visions of individual artists: this is a passion I share with gallery owners whose special ability to identify hidden talents I admire,” said Ilaria Bonacossa, director of Artissima. “Fondamenta was born thanks to the extraordinary curatorial team of Artissima 2020, showing their work ’in progress,’ pursuing the goal of giving galleries the opportunity to take part in a collective project at a very delicate moment for the art world. A small curated project that offers the public an experience that can be enjoyed even in their spare time, giving new stimuli to go out and discover contemporary art, supporting our galleries in a new way, and being a team player to collectively propose a virtual meeting for both new lovers of contemporary art and collectors of every generation.”

“We focused our selection on criteria capable of highlighting different artistic practices significant in their individuality to the contemporary, rooted in our time, but also capable of reflecting on historical genealogies. Practices capable of outlining a visionary future landscape, all of which carry an important impact on critical thinking,” added Present Future curators Ilaria Gianni and Fernanda Brenner.

Lorenzo Giusti and Mouna Mekouar, curators of Back to the Future, say, "Selected from among the artists who have participated in the past ten editions of Artissima in the Back to the Future section, these artists have tackled the same issues while each imagining different answers. Together, they offer keys to interpreting a past but still present world. Their works provide us with a “useful sensibility,” participating in the elaboration of our history in the present."

Speaking about the Drawings section, curators Letizia Ragaglia and Bettina Steinbrügge state, “This section will be entirely dedicated to female artists. We wanted to delve into the place occupied by women in contemporary drawing and explore the many facets of this expressive medium: abstract, primitive, functional, urban, mixed media, surreal, amazonian, objective... The drawings are microcosms that allow an intimate look into the world of artists and women artists.”

Finally, Valerio del Baglivo, curator of New Entries: “In times of social distance, I have selected artists whose practices result in a constant search to define identity, to propose ’an anatomy’ of different bodies that welcomes the power of the senses. Working through the politics of representation, these artists adopt inherently interdisciplinary forms and produce works ranging from live performance, film, installations, painting, and texts.”

Pictured: Rosa Santos, Maha Maamoun, Untitled (Parrot) (2015; inkjet print on dibond, 59 x 80 cm). Courtesy the artist and Rosa Santos, Valencia.

Artissima presents its new digital project: Foundations

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