Report 2007

The year 2006-2007 has been be a period of great efforts and important recognition. The important collaboration with Gemmo s.p.a., a leading company in engineering construction services and facility management, was the first institutional sponsor to Viafarini, as well as the American Center Foundation Grant, the prestigious international prize given to Viafarini, both of which have demonstrated an experimental spirit in supporting emerging artists in the course of various projects.

Amongst these, with the collaboration of Provincia di Milano the project Milano on the Move began in 2006, enabling artists a certain ‘mobility’ abroad. In other words, by inviting various directors of prestigious international art institutions to participate in a residence and research program in Milan, this has proved to be an invaluable opportunity for Italian artists to display their work and get in contact with foreign curators, thus establishing possible forms of collaborations abroad. Amongst the participants in 2006 were Karin Eklund from the Delfina Projects in London, Els van Odijk from the Rijksakademie in Amsterdam, Christoph Tannert, from the Künstlerhaus Bethanien in Berlin, Euridice Arratia from the Art-Omi in New York. Whereas in 2007 the proposal was accepted by Vasif Kortun from the Platform Garantì in Istanbul, Chus Martinez from the Frankfurter Kunstverein and Katerina Gregos from Argos in Brussels.
As a result of the relations formed during Milano on the Move, Viafarini has since 2006 been responsible for organizing the residence program abroad for the winner of the Premio Furla per l’Arte. Furthermore, it has become a point of reference for artists applying to the residence program of the Rijkakademie in Amsterdam.
The project has also emphasized the importance of preparing young artists for possible interviews with foreign institutions, and with this scope three workshops were organized in November. Curated by Gabi Scardi, with Maja Bajevic, Adrian Paci, and Anton Muntadas this event was a great success and received positive feedback from many enthusiastic participants.

The 2006-2007 season opened in September with a solo show by Argentinian artist Daniel Gonzàlez, titled Clothes Project. Sono incazzato nero e tutto questo non lo voglio più, curated by Andrea Lissoni. A fashion designer and visual artist, particularly famous for his eccentric performances, Gonzàlez exhibited his work through sown banners and clothings. Also spectacular was the concert-performance with which Nico Vascellari, the young Trevisan winner of the 2005 Premio Internazionale della Performance di Trento, presented the Cuckoo project, curated by Milovan Farronato.

The solo exhibition by Swiss artist David Reggli, You, can you recommend your psychiatrist? Curated by Noah Stolz, the.season’s core project opened in February 2007. Re-Enacted Painting , curated by Milovan Farronato, was concerned with an extensive research on painting, its recent developement and its future potential. It was composed of various events: a collective exhibition of Italian artists, which gave the title to the entire project, two solo exhibitions by foreign emerging artists (other than Renggli, was Korean artist Hyunjhin Baik),and presentations and workshops by well-known artists such as Nathalie Djurberg, Katharina Fritsch, Pere Llobera and Maria Moranti.
Ten were the the participants of the collective show that had been selected by the curator from the archives of Careof and Viafarini: Atrium-Project (Claudia Dallagiovanna e Riccardo Arena), Simone Barresi, Lorenza Boisi, Rossana Buremi, Manuele Cerutti, Martina Della Valle, Paolo Gonzato, Daniela Pedretti, Felice Serreli and Simone Tosca.
Taking one of the most diffused curatorial aims to the extreme, that of establishing a dialogue amongst the artworks, Re-Enacted Painting presented itself as a a large installation created by a small group which dealt with the theme of painting for an extended period of time. After a series of meetings in the course of various months these meetings were documented by Marco Tagliaferro and Martina Angelotti, and published in the exhibition catalogue.
Within the same project Re-Enacted Painting Preview, an event organized together with the leading company of managment consulting A.T.Kearney to inaugurate the new Milanese branch, invited the artists from the collective show to present their created artworks or those considered for their offices.
The event closed with the solo exhibition by Hyunjhin Baik, Adjective Look, a site-specific installation, the result of two-month’s work during which the gallery turned into a blank page on which the artist materialized a compostion through sound, painting, sculpture, installation and performance.

Since April 2008, the opening of the DOCVA (Documentation Centre for Visual Arts), the new documentation centre for the visual contemporary arts, has marked an important developement within its venue at the Fabbrica del Vapore as an addition to the research and service facilities of Careof and Viafarini.

Within its historical site in Via Farini 35, Viafarini has in the meantime established the VIR Viafarini-in-residence, the new program that permits artists and\or curators to spend a period of research in Milan. The residence constitutes of four apartments on the first floor, in addition to the two artist’s studios within the exhibitive area in Viafarini. The first resident artist was Irena Lagator, from Montenegro, who in October and Novembre 2007 collaborated with two important musical institutions in Milan:the Orchestra Filarmonica del Teatro all Scala and L’Orchestra Giuseppe Verdi for an artistic project that would be object of her next solo exhibition at the Contemporary Art Gallery of the National Museum of Montenegro.