In 1974 BolognaFiere had the intuition to present, within what was then still called the Fiera Campionaria, a small section dedicated to modern and contemporary art. In the first edition, there were just ten galleries; the following year, there were already 200.
1974-2024 is a milestone that no other Italian art fair has yet crossed; it is such a significant anniversary that the Ministry of Enterprise and Made in Italy will celebrate it with the issue of a postage stamp.
Arte Fiera celebrates its 50th birthday by focusing on its origins. The 2024 public programme will therefore revisit episodes, personalities, publications of those years, starting from the founding. In doing so, it will also celebrate the 1970s in Bologna, an extraordinary season in which the city was at the forefront in the visual arts, in architecture, in imagining new forms of relationship between art, politics and society.
The 2024 edition of Arte Fiera picks up the thread of one of the most successful editions of recent years, that of 2023, thus confirming the location of the last edition (pavilions 25 and 26) and its winning collaborations, starting with the one between Artistic Director Simone Menegoi and Enea Righi, manager and collector of international level, as Operations Director.
A total of 196 exhibitors will participate in Arte Fiera 2024.
The Main Section of Arte Fiera, divided as always between historic and contemporary art, will be flanked by three curated and invitation-only sections: Photography and Moving Images, Pittura XXI and Multipli, which will feature works in editions ranging from artist’s books to design.
Davide Ferri, critic and independent curator is confirmed as curator of Pittura XXI, while Fotografia e immagini in movimento is entrusted for the second year to Giangavino Pazzola, curator of Camera – Centro italiano per la fotografia (Turin). New instead for Multipli, which sees the arrival of art critic and historian Alberto Salvadori.
Alongside the curated sections, Percorso returns: an itinerary linking a number of stands in the Main Section according to the thematic criterion of drawing.
Opus Novum, the commission for an unpublished work by an established Italian artist, goes this year to Luisa Lambri, one of the Italian artists working with the language of photography who is most appreciated internationally.
Arte Fiera 2024 will also see the unveiling of the second and final part of the previous Opus Novum commission, entrusted to Alberto Garutti: a plaque permanently placed at the main entrance to the fairgrounds that bears the inscription, in Italian and English, Tutti i passi che ho fatto nella mia vita hanno portato qui, ora. Arte Fiera thus completes its homage to one of the most important Italian artists of the last fifty years, who passed away only a few months ago.
The collaboration between Arte Fiera and Fondazione Furla is renewed for the programme of live actions curated by Bruna Roccasalva, Artistic Director of the Foundation. The protagonist of the new edition is the Peruvian artist Daniela Ortiz, who will perform an unprecedented and specially conceived intervention entitled Tiro al Blanco.
The performance, in fact, was at home at Arte Fiera from the very first editions; it is a little-known and even less well-documented story, on which the exhibition ‘Practically Nothing to Sell’ casts a first glance. Performance at Arte Fiera in 1976, curated by Uliana Zanetti, Curator of Collections at MAMbo – Museo d’Arte Moderna di Bologna.
Another exhibition investigates the origins of the fair starting with the catalogue of the first edition. Curated by art historian Clarissa Ricci, Numero Zero. The first Arte Fiera catalogue aligns enlarged reproductions of all the pages of this rare publication, allowing visitors to discover the ten galleries that were protagonists of the fair’s pilot edition.
Now in its third edition is the Book Talk conversations cycle, a programme of presentations dedicated exclusively to art books, curated by Guendalina Piselli. A busy calendar of appointments that offers the public some of the most interesting Italian titles of recent (or forthcoming) publication involving critics, scholars and artists.
On the occasion of the 50th edition of Arte Fiera, the ART CITY Bologna exhibition, curated for the seventh consecutive year by Lorenzo Balbi, has chosen to pay homage to the most important modern artist born and lived in the city of Bologna, Giorgio Morandi (1890 – 1964), on the 60th anniversary of his death, proposing a programme inspired by him.
Five special projects will explore and reinterpret the Maestro’s work through different contemporary languages.
Finally, Saturday 3rd February sees the return of one of the public’s favourite events: the ART CITY White Night, with the possibility of enjoying the city’s artistic offerings also in the evening hours, thanks to the collaboration of cultural and commercial operators who will extend opening hours until midnight.
For more information visit www.artefiera.it.
