Artissima Art Fair. 30th Edition

Artissima 2023 will offer initiatives that confirm its unique position on the European cultural scene and its ability to attract the most interesting galleries, artists, collectors and curators on an international level, with the promise – always kept – of an experimental, cutting-edge event. Artissima celebrates this important milestone by capitalizing on its many years of discovery, research and relations in order to look to the future in a constantly innovative and dynamic way.

From Friday 3 November to Sunday 5 November 2023, the spaces of the Oval in Torino will welcome the four flagship sections of the fair – Main Section, New Entries, Monologue/Dialogue and Art Spaces & Editions – and three curated sections – Disegni, Present Future and Back to the Future – also hosted on digital platform Artissima Voice Over. Artissima 2023 will involve the participation of 181 Italian and international galleries, including 68 monographic and curated projects to present the work of represented artists to the public.

In the words of Luigi Fassi, Director of Artissima: “The 30th iteration of Artissima in Torino reflects the fair’s ability to develop a vision based on three decades of activity to continue to look into the future, relying on the power of the fair’s Italian and international network. All this has been made possible by intense activities of research and scouting on a global level, to continue to offer collectors and museum professionals the excitement of encountering galleries and artists at the highest level from Europe, the Americas, Africa and Asia. Almost 40 galleries are taking part in Artissima for the first time in 2023, together with countless confirmations and returns, bearing witness to the fair’s appeal and its role as a catalyst of experimentation, research and investment on the art market. As can be seen from our archives across three decades, once again this year those who believe in Artissima – gallerists, collectors, curators and visitors – will be able to intercept the works and artists that will be the protagonists of the near future in Torino”. Internationally renowned for its focus on pioneering practices and its role as a launch pad for up-and-coming artists and galleries, Artissima attracts a large audience of collectors, sector professionals and art lovers every year. With each edition, the fair welcomes curators, directors of art institutions and foundations, as well as patrons of museums from all over the world who are involved in various ways in its programme. The vitality of Artissima resonates throughout the city, thanks to the many cultural projects produced in collaboration with public institutions, museums, foundations and galleries across the region. Artissima contributes to the growth of the Italian contemporary art market, stimulating and supporting collectors with an eye for innovation, and a continuously evolving critical and curatorial vision.

The theme of Artissima 2023 is Relations of Care. Suggested by Brazilian anthropologist Renzo Taddei, professor at the Universidade Federal de São Paulo in Brazil, in a recent essay on indigenous thinking, the concept identifies and proposes care as a premise and as the ultimate aim of the advancement of knowledge, which first of all must be directed toward preserving the diversity and value of every form of life in the world. In the essay Intervention of Another Nature: Resources for Thinking in (and out of) the Anthropocene, published in the anthology Everyday Matters (Ruby Press, Berlin, 2022), Renzo Taddei reflects on the need to validate every form of expertise and production of new knowledge only by starting from a radical dimension of care that opens up an unprecedented sense of responsibility towards the natural world and all the species that live inside it. Applying this reversed perspective, thinking in a Western matrix feeds the possibility of opening to a new imaginary, based on the model of the native communities of the Amazon, which have always put care for the environment and surrounding nature at the center of their existence as fundamental factors for survival.

Taddei thus urges us to follow this model of thinking, abandoning any ideology of otherness and superiority of western man in relation to nature, to reinstate contact with other forms of knowledge and coexistence, and to generate new possible relations of care.

Renzo Taddei, one of the most highly acclaimed and innovative voices in contemporary anthropology from the South American continent, will be a special guest of the fair and will have the opportunity to explain his thinking during this edition of Artissima 2023. Through art, care nurtures the individual and social imagination, becoming a matrix of all the relationships that form the fabric of our lives. Artissima, across 30 years of experience, has generated precisely these relations of care among gallerists, artists, collectors, professionals and art lovers, bringing together stories, formulating new narratives and providing novel ways of interpreting the present and the future to create a true community around art.

“Taking inspiration from the words of Renzo Taddei – says Luigi Fassi – today we need to accelerate the growth of our imagination, to create more authentic forms of comprehension of reality. In this context, it is precisely art that can play a special role, that of interpreting – more acutely than other disciplines – the means of arriving at a dimension of care, to guide and enlighten our actions and awareness, assigning value to the variety, multiplicity and mingling of everything that takes part in our world. Art, in this sense, becomes powerful storytelling, capable of triggering a force for change, a care that becomes conviction about the urgency of responsibility.

This is the message underpinning the 2023 edition of Artissima; an invitation to have faith in the imaginary created by artists and their works, grasping stimuli and impressions to reshape our thoughts and to accompany change in our own persons.

The visual identity of the 2023 edition is by Torino-based graphic design studio FIONDA directed by Roberto Maria Clemente. Relations of Care has been translated into a coordinated image that alludes to harmonies in evolution, ecosystems and organisms in dialogue with each other, determined by multiplicity and mixing. These are communities composed of relations based on the key role they play in the conservation of a planetary balance, organisms with their level of knowledge and cooperation that develop new relations of care capable of imagining new scenarios.

The curated sections move forward with Irina Zucca Alessandrelli (curator, Collezione Ramo – Milano) for the Disegni section, and Maurin Dietrich (director, Kunstverein München – Munich) and Saim Demircan (independent curator and writer, Torino) for the section Present Future.

The curatorial team of Back to the Future is composed for the first time by Defne Ayas (freelance curator, Berlin) and Francesco Manacorda (freelance curator, London). Besides being physically present at the fair, the curated sections will exist online on the digital platform Artissima Voice Over with special in-depth coverage, produced thanks to the support of Fondazione Compagnia di San Paolo.

For the second consecutive year, the presence of Curatorial Advisors underlines the value of pioneering innovation in the fair’s identity, as conveyed by Krist Gruijthuijsen, director of the KW Institute for Contemporary Art in Berlin, and Jacopo Crivelli Visconti, an independent curator based in Sao Paulo, Brazil. Together with the selection committee and the team of curators, they will contribute to formulating and narrating an edition that underscores the experimental character and the research conducted by the most interesting players on the international contemporary art scene.

Identity. Artissima celebrates its 30th anniversary, with the support of Fondazione Compagnia di San Paolo by producing the project IDENTITY: a three- year programme that assigns value to the identifying features of the fair, which for each edition will offer in-depth focal points to shed light on the strategic lines that have contributed, across 30 years of history, to the present positioning of Artissima in the art world.

Identity 2023 concentrates on the New Entries section, which welcomes the most interesting emerging international galleries enabling them to take part in the fair for the first time. Every year, this section brings proof of Artissima’s expertise in the field of international scouting, a key factor of its project approach that has always assigned value to the galleries of the new generation seeking intense relationships with collectors, curators and art lovers within the Artissima context. The outcome is the construction of a network of contacts that goes beyond the positive response of the market, becoming a true motor of growth for the galleries’ activities and their work in relation to the artists they represent. Identity takes concrete form in the activation of the IDENTITY Fund for New Entries, an economic resource of support for three galleries to participate in the section, and in the creation of New Entries BAR, a special project in the fair curated by Cripta747, with the objective of offering galleries in the section another showcase and an opportunity to reveal their specific areas of investigation. The path of IDENTITY in 2023 underscores the history of Artissima, which has fostered a dual identity from the outset: that of a market platform, and that of a reservoir of cultural production.

The human condition @ Gallerie d’Italia – Torino. For the second consecutive year, after the success in 2022 of Collective Individuals curated by Leonardo Bigazzi, Artissima, together with Intesa Sanpaolo, Main Partner of the fair, presents a project of films and videos by artists formulated and produced in dialogue with Gallerie d’Italia – Torino, which will be the host location. The immersive space of the museum will present The human condition, curated by Jacopo Crivelli Visconti, art critic and independent curator. The exhibition of video works, many of which are being shown for the first time in Italy, features artists represented by galleries participating in Artissima. The dialogue with Intesa Sanpaolo will also continue at the fair with the presentation of an original exhibition project which confirms the value of the partnership with Artissima.

Where the traces fade away @ Centro città. Supported by Fondazione per l’Arte Moderna e Contemporanea CRT with the aim of bringing out the value of its collection, and curated by Artissima, Where the traces fade away is an exhibition that spreads into the iconic locations of cultural life in Torino. It is structured as a true rediscovery of the city through the experience of five works reflecting the quality of the CRT collection, acquired over the course of the last twenty years and conserved within the contexts of the GAM – Galleria Civica di Arte Moderna of Torino and the Castello di Rivoli Museo d’arte contemporanea.

Perché non Lilloni? @ Hotel Principi di Piemonte | UNA Esperienze. For the fourth consecutive year, the magical ballroom of Hotel Principi di Piemonte | UNA Esperienze will host, in collaboration with Artissima, an exhibition project titled Perché non Lilloni?, focused on the work of Umberto Lilloni curated by Massimo Minini and his gallery of the same name in Brescia.

New Entries Bar for Identity. New Entries BAR is a place, a project, a story created with the objective of showcasing the research of the galleries in the New Entries section and their artists inside the conceptual platform IDENTITY, supported by Fondazione Compagnia di San Paolo. The New Entries BAR will be coordinated by the group Cripta747 and will welcome the fair audience into a special space inside the pavilion.

Artissima Digital. Thanks to Fondazione Compagnia di San Paolo, which has supported Artissima Digital since 2017, the commitment continues to amplify the experience of the fair through the production of content and in-depth digital coverage on the platforms artissima.art and Artissima Voice Over, focusing on the three curated sections. Besides the return of the AudioGuides to accompany visitors to the fair, the 2023 edition includes two new features of original contents in collaboration with important figures in the world of culture. The in-depth multimedia cultural magazine Lucy. Sulla cultura, in dialogue with the Brazilian anthropologist Renzo Taddei, will explore the multiple nuances of the theme of this edition of the fair, Relations of Care, while personalities from the world of art, theatre and literature will take turns at the microphones of the new podcast Lo stereoscopio dei solitari, in collaboration with Il Giornale dell’Arte, an initiative launched during the days of the fair. Lauretana, a long-term partner of Artissima, has supported the AudioGuides for the second time this year: the podcast project formulated to accompany visitors in an independent and personal tour through the booths of the fair. The project is part of Artissima Digital powered by Fondazione Compagnia di San Paolo.

The fair’s committee selects four sections: Main Section presenting a selection of the most representative galleries on the international scene. This year 98 galleries are showcased, including 46 international exhibitors. New Entries, section dedicated to emerging international players, with 17 galleries this year, 13 of which are from abroad. Monologue/Dialogue, section dedicated to emerging galleries and/or galleries with an experimental approach, presenting either a monographic booth or works by two artists in dialogue, with 38 galleries of which 24 are from abroad. Art Spaces & Editions includes 9 exhibitors from galleries, project spaces and non-profit initiatives, bookstores, all specializing in artists’ editions and multiples.

The galleries of Artissima 2023 come from 33 countries and 4 continents: Austria, Brazil, Canada, China, Colombia, Cuba, Czech Republic, France, Germany, Greece, Hong Kong, Hungary, Israel, Italy, Lithuania, Mexico, Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovenia, Spain, South Africa, South Korea, Switzerland, Thailand, Tunisia, Turkey, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom, United States, Uruguay and Zimbabwe.

39 galleries are showing works for the first time in the fair. They include Good Weather (North Little Rock, Little Rock, Chicago), Cristina Guerra (Lisbon), Meyer*Kainer (Vienna), Raster (Warsaw), The Sunday Painter (London), Unit 17 (Vancouver). From a global perspective, the event welcomes the participation of a number of African galleries, including First Floor Gallery Harare (Harare, Victoria Falls), Whatiftheworld (Cape Town), in the section New Entries, Reservoir (Cape Town), and South American galleries including Marilia Razuk (Sao Paulo) and A Gentil Carioca (Rio de Janeiro, Sao Paulo). For the first time, there is also a gallery from Thailand, Tang Contemporary Art (Bangkok, various locations). In the New Entries section for emerging galleries that have been open for less than five years, the participants include among others, Barbati (Venezia), Efremidis (Berlin, Seoul), Eugenia Delfini (Roma), Hoa (Sao Paulo), Mou Projects (Hong Kong) and Fabian Lang (Zurich).

Artissima Art Fair – www.artissima.art