The Biennial of the Moving Image leaves its historic Geneva venue after 30 years and moves to Turin

For the first time in its more than 30-year history, the Biennale de l’Image en Mouvement is leaving its historic venue in Geneva and moving to Turin. Thanks to an unprecedented and articulated collaboration between the Centre d’Art Contemporain Genève and OGR - Officine Grandi Riparazioni di Torino, the 2019 edition of the Biennale is reconfigured and presented in the evocative spaces of the former workshops in Corso Castelfidardo, under the guidance and curatorship of Andrea Lissoni, Senior Curator of the Tate Modern in London, and Andrea Bellini, Director of the Centre d’Art Contemporain Genève. From June 21 to September 29, 2019, the works of eight international artists will thus be on view within a scenic setting created thanks to the support of Andreas Angelidakis, former architect of the 2014 Berlin Biennale and Documenta 2017.

“In our mission,” explains Massimo Lapucci, general director of OGR, “the OGRs represent a place of experimentation in the city but open to the world, a place in constant evolution where excellence and talent come together in new ideas and projects. With this in mind, since their opening about two years ago we have been building links and synergies with local and international institutions and operators by sealing important partnerships such as the one presented today with the Centre d’Art Contemporain Genève, which not only brought the Biennial of the Moving Image out of its mother house for the first time, but also allowed the co-production of some of the works in the exhibition and the realization of a joint catalog. It is a collaboration that once again positions OGR as a hub of international contemporary culture with a broad spectrum from exhibition and performance art to innovation and tech that just starting next week sees the opening of the new OGR Teche space the launch of Torino Startupweek.”

The Biennial, titled The Sound of Screens Imploding, takes off from the idea that the era of projection on screens is coming to an end to make way for new and reverberating realities, investigating the present state of images and their exhibition display, emphasizing the experimental potential of new languages and analyzing what are the peculiarities that determine them. The analysis on current events and politics is staged through a series of dialogues between artists differing in poetics and geographical origin, but all solidly rooted in the history of their time.

Thus, works by Lawrence Abu Hamdan, Korakrit Arunanondchai & Alex Gvojic, Meriem Bennani, Ian Cheng, Elysia Crampton, Tamara Henderson, and Kahlil Joseph are featured in the exhibition. Moreover, Andreas Angelidakis, in addition to presenting his work previously exhibited in Geneva in a new form, has created an environmental installation for the occasion that is meant to bring video works and architecture into dialogue through one coherent project.

The Geneva Biennial of the Moving Image is the only biennial in the world to present only and exclusively unpublished works, commissioned and produced in the context of the exhibition. In 2018, the organizational and economic effort of such a complex and ambitious event has been made possible thanks to the collaboration between the Geneva and Turin institutions, which have co-produced some of the works in the exhibition (particularly those by Meriem Bennani and Tamara Henderson). The CAC and OGR are also working together to produce a joint catalog published by Corraini Edizioni, which will be on sale in the coming months at the OGR transliteral shop.

“The Biennial of the Moving Image encompasses some foundational aspects for Officine Grandi Riparazioni, which were the reason and the driving force behind this partnership,” stresses Nicola Ricciardi, Artistic Director of OGR, “not only for the idea of movement, which is the basis of all our artistic programming, but also and above all for the possibility of confronting the medium of video. After having brought performance, music and dance inside the exhibition spaces, now, always moved by the desire to reinterpret, readapt and at the same time emphasize the architectural space, we explore this new medium of expression, in all its declinations.”

“It was a wonderful experience to see the Geneva Biennale transformed in the spaces of the OGR,” says Andrea Bellini, Director of the Centre d’Art Contemporain Genève. “I have to say that here in Turin the exhibition is particularly powerful. The Officine Grandi Riparazioni is a fascinating place, the spaces are fabulous, and-along with the installation designed for the occasion by Andreas Angelidakis-they manage to give new life to the works. My hope is that the partnership between the Biennale and OGR can be renewed in the future: we love the place, we loved working with this team and the end result is extraordinary, so I hope we can continue on this path.”

The Moving Image Biennial is usually accompanied by a calendar of screenings capable of giving the public an overall look at the project: on the occasion of its move to Turin, thanks to the unprecedented collaboration between the OGR and the National Cinema Museum, a rich program of films selected by the two curators will be presented in September. Finally, on September 28 and 29, the finissage of the Biennale will be an opportunity to celebrate the second anniversary of the reopening of the OGR with an evening of music and performances organized in synergy with the avant-pop festival Club To Club.

“It is particularly significant that the second birthday of OGR is being celebrated in conjunction with the closing of the Moving Image Biennial, an event that has always focused on providing space for experimentation with innovative languages,” adds OGR President Fulvio Gianaria. “Innovation is in fact one of the key words around which the mission of the reborn Officine Grandi Riparazioni was elaborated, with the aim of concretely making them not only a container of events, but an ecosystem for the development and growth of the cultural, social and economic capital of the territory. In almost two years of opening, the Officine Grandi Riparazioni has shown that it has become a complex cultural hub, with a wide-ranging and quality, inclusive and educational offer, capable of speaking to a vast and heterogeneous pool of people. A gathering space for all types of audiences, diverse in education and interests, a place open to the city and the world, where unique content and different disciplines find a home for production and cultural contamination in continuous transformation.”

For all information you can visit the official website of OGR - Officine Grandi Riparazioni di Torino.

Pictured: Biennale Dell’immagine In Movimento - The Sound of Screens Imploding, installation view, OGR - Officine Grandi Riparazioni, Turin. Ph. credit: Giorgio Perottino

Source: press release

The Biennial of the Moving Image leaves its historic Geneva venue after 30 years and moves to Turin

Warning: the translation into English of the original Italian article was created using automatic tools. We undertake to review all articles, but we do not guarantee the total absence of inaccuracies in the translation due to the program. You can find the original by clicking on the ITA button. If you find any mistake,please contact us.