4th Schio Biennale of Papermade Art 2019-20

The 4th edition of the Schio Biennale focusing on Papermade exhibition is going on at Fogazzaro Palace in Schio. It is a biannual art exhibition on paper art.

This post is about my favourite 15 art works from the 2019-20 Papermade exhibition. 

The Theme of Papermade 2019-20

The theme of 4th edition of Papermade curated by Valeria Bertesina is "Beauty in the non-essential". Art and beauty may be seen as unnecessary, even superfluous, but I feel that art and beauty add life to our lives. Prehistoric humans understood it, when they made cave art, necklaces out of colourful beads and painted figures on earthenware.

This exhibition started in October 2019 and will finish on 9 February 2020 (Note: it has been extended till 13 April 2020). It includes two special events - (1) a series of "sculptures" by Joseph Rossi which re-interpret some iconic & provocative works of the well-known Italian artist Maurizio Cattelan, and (2) a mini- exhibition of 15 artists from Finland. The image above presents "Him" by Joseph Rossi, which was a re-interpretation of the Maurizio Cattelan sculpture (2001) of a school boy with the face of Hitler kneeling in prayer.

Re-Interpreting Maurizio Cattelan

Joseph Rossi is a graphic artist based in the nearby Thiene. This edition of Papermade is hosting few of his installations, including some which are a homage to the iconic works of Maurizio Cattelan.

Cattelan, a famous artist based in Padova (Padua), has been in the news recently because of his provocative work of "art" which had a banana fixed to the wall with a duct-tape in the "Art Basel" exhibition in Miami Beach USA, which was sold to an unnamed French art collector for 120,000 dollars and eaten by the Georgian performance artist David Datuna. I think that such works are an example of performance art, which may even be seen as a criticism of the way "conceptual art" is dominating the various recent biennales.

The image above presents another of Joseph Rossi's re-interpretation of Cattelan's provocative works - of the 1999 wax sculpture called "Ninth Hour" which showed Pope John Paul II lying dead crushed by a meteorite.

Finnish Artists in Papermade

There are works of 15 well-known artists from Finland in this Papermade exhibition. They range from art-works with pastel and ink on different kinds of paper, to etching, mezzotint and digital prints. They also include 2 installations - (1) Trio Schio, a paper-meche work by Arja Jappinen; and (2) Beauty, an assemblage including cut paper and origami by Jouni Boucht (in the image below).

Among all the other Finnish artists, my favourite were the 'charcoal on paper' art works by Paula Suominen, presented in the image below.

Another work which I liked very much was called "Land of the Free", made with ink and spray paint by Egs, a well-known graffiti artist from Finland. The image below shows part of this work.

Other Art-works at Papermade

An important presence at Papermade was of the Australian artist Giuseppe Romeo. His cockroach-like origami "sculptures" with a metallic finish, greeted visitors on the stairs and spread over the exhibition, on the floors and the walls, looking like an infestation.

I liked the colours and vivacity of the collages by the Italian artist Elsa Pietrelli.

I was touched by the digital print of a woman's face by the Vietnamese artist Quang Pham Khac, who explained that it was an image of his wife, which he has been making in different forms over the recent period to cope up with her death.

I loved the colours and feelings evoked by the series of paintings/collages by Silvio Cattani inspired by the poetry of the famous Russian poet Sergej Yesenin.

The tropical foliage (below) and the human figures created by Canadian artist Zachari Logan in his "Eunuch Tapestrieses", with pastel art-work on black paper, were visually very striking because of their vivid colours and details.

I am not a fan of the "conceptual art". Even in this exhibition, there were a couple of such installations, which I felt were unexciting and a kind of lazy art. However, I liked the idea behind Iginio Iurilli's simple installation called "Exploding tomato sauce can" (below).

I liked the prints from etchings/woodcut/Relief by Tribhuvan Kumar Dev from India, Haladaj Wieslaw from Poland, Linda Whitney from USA (presented in the image below), Marco Trentin & Leonardo Marenghi from Italy and Yuji Hiratsuka from Japan.

Finally, I liked the tiny and exquisite water-colours of birds by Michela Moretto (below).

For this post I have presented pictures of 15 art-works which I had liked. However, I am very much aware of my own fickle subjectivity - on another day, I would have chosen other art-works. If I ask you to choose your favourite art-works from this exhibition, surely your choice would be different from these 15 works!

Conclusions

I think that this edition of Papermade has a lot to see, admire and think. Generally speaking, in an exhibition on paper art, I would like to see works which use paper in innovative ways and not just as a background to make prints or to paint with ink, pastels or water-colours. In that sense, there were not many new ideas in the exhibition. However, if you visit it with an expectation of seeing art which stimulates you and makes you reflect, you won't be disappointed.

Let me conclude this post with two cut-paper origami inspired works - the delicate "Between you and I" by Susanna Doccioli (above), and the gossamer "Suspended Labyrinth" by Susy Manzo (below).

The exhibition is open till 9 February 2020 (Note: it has been extended till 13 April 2020), so if you are visiting Schio, do not miss it. It is a 5 minutes walk from the railway station. 

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Highlights from My Journeys in 2019

2019 was full of journeys for me, from Philippines in the east to Brazil in the west. This post is to remember the most significant moments of my travels. The first picture (below) is from a wonderful journey across Kerala and Karnataka in India - from the Chennakeshava temple in Belur.

There was a time, when I did a lot of international travel. Then over the past decade, my travelling had gradually decreased, though I still continued to visit 3-4 countries every year. However, in 2019, a number of events came together, creating greater opportunities for my travel.

Travels in India

I started 2019 by travelling to Delhi in January. During this visit, I decided to explore the expanded network of the Delhi metro. For example, one day I went to search for the Dalit Pride Park in NOIDA. On my way back, I stopped in Jamia Milia and went to visit the tomb of Dr Zakir Hussain (in the image below), who was the President of India during 1967-69.

As a child, I had met Dr. Hussain and the well-known artist M.F. Hussain at Triveni Kala Sangam in Delhi and had vivid memories of that meeting. I was curious to visit his tomb.

In January, I also went to Kerala, where in Fort Kochi I visited the Kochi Art Biennale 2018-19. The image below presents an installation by Venu V. from the biennale.

I travelled in trains and buses along the Kerala coast, going from Kochi to Mangalore and then to the town of Hassan in Karnataka. From Hassan, I visited the amazing temples of Halebidu and Belur. The first image at the top presents one of the amazing women sculptures from the Chennakeshava temple in Belur.

Back in Delhi in February, I visited the recently rennovated Sundar Gardens near Hamayun tomb. The image below shows Sundar burj from these beautiful gardens.

February was also an opportunity to visit the street art in Lodhi colony, about which I had heard a lot. It was the time when some artists were visiting the city to make new murals, so during my next visit to Delhi, I am planning to visit this area once more to see the new additions.

In March, we had a family visit to the Kumbh mela in Prayagraj (Allahabad). My cousin sister had passed away suddenly and our visit included a ceremony for dispersing her ashes at Sangam, where river Ganges meets Yamuna. This visit was also an opportunity to visit and meet persons from our extended family and our old family home, before coming back to Delhi and concluding my India visit.

Milan, Italy

Back in Italy, in early April, I was part of a conference in Milan. This was an opportunity to explore the Naviglio canal. I had been there many years ago and remembered it as an old and decaying area. With the cleaning of Naviglio, the whole place has changed completely. Now it is full of tourists visiting crowded restaurants and new glittering shops.

Liberia

In the last week of April, I was back in Monrovia, the capital of Liberia. There is not much to see in Monrovia and security concerns make it difficult to go out. I also had to run a training course, so there was not much free time. However, one early morning, before the starting of the training, I did manage a walk along the seaside.

I also travelled for a day to Ganta in Nimba county to meet some old friends. They are trying to build up a wild life sanctuary in Liberia. May be in future, one day there will be places to visit here.

Mongolia

I visited Mongolia twice in 2019. The first time at the end of June when I stayed in Ulaanbaatar and did not travel to other places. However, I did go out for different walks to discover the city, such as a walk to look at the sculptures of a camel caravan.

During the second visit, in October, we visited some provinces around Ulaanbaatar. One of the visits was to Arkhangai and on the way, we stopped to see the Buddhist monastery at Korakorum, the old capital of Mongolia during the times of Gengiz Khan (in the image below). It was a place that I had dreamt of visiting one day and the visit was really great.

Brazil - Campo Grande and Niteroi

In August I was in Brazil for a couple of weeks, first in Campo Grande and then in Niteroi, near Rio de Janeiro. In between my work commitments, I had plenty of time to go around for walks in Brazil. In Rio de Janeiro, a short ferry ride away from Nietroi, I went to different museums but my most precious experience was visiting an Ai Wei Wei art exhibition.

Niteroi is a wonderful place to stay with some of the most beautiful views of the Bay of Guanabara and the amazing skyline of Rio de Janeiro (in the image below).

Manila, Philippines

Back from Brazil and with a short break of a few days, I had to go Manila for a conference. The 12 hours time difference from Brazil, made this visit very difficult for me. I tried everyday to walk and discover parts of Manila that I had not seen earlier. Thus, I joined the visit organized by our conference hosts to visit Intramuros, the Spanish part of Manila (Fort Santiago in the image below).

Istanbul, Turkey

In October, on my way back from Mongolia, I stayed overnight in Istanbul. I have passed through Istanbul airport many times, but had never stopped there and was hoping to visit the city. However, during my one day of stay, it was raining most of the time and thus, I was forced to stay in my hotel room. The image below was clicked from the bus going back to the airport. I hope to have another opportunity to visit Turkey in the new year.

Geneva, Switzerland

Between August to October, I had travelled so much that I became unwell and had to cancel a visit to Spain. I had also made plans for a family gathering in the USA, but I was so tired of travelling that I cancelled it.

The only journey outside Italy I made was to Geneva for a meeting at the World Health Organisation in mid-November. Even during the brief stay, I found some time to go for a walk along the left bank of the Leman lake, which I like very much (image below). Unfortunately, there was not enough free time to visit the botanical gardens, another of my favourite places in Geneva.

Italy - Padova, Treviso & Venice

Veneto region of Italy, where I live, is full of beautiful little medieval towns. This year, I visited some of them such as Castelfranco Veneto, Padova, Treviso, Thiene and Vicenza (below an image from the Padova Pride parade).

In November, I also managed to visit the Venice Art Biennale before it ended. It had a couple of installations that I had seen in Kochi art biennale in the beginning of the year. The image below shows the visually striking giant installation by Lorenzo Quinn from this Biennale.

Conclusions

I am glad that I could visit so many countries during 2019, though I overdid it! My new year resolution is to have fewer work commitments in other countries in 2020, so that I can enjoy my travels more.

Already my bags are packed and I am preparing to go back to India. I want to conclude this post with an image from the street theatre perforamnce by students of Aurobindo college in Delhi, which I had seen during my last visit to Delhi - the play was about the vanishing languages of India and was called "Zubaan sambhal ke". I like street theatre plays very much and am hoping to catch some of them during my visit.

One new development in 2019 was my increasing use of phone-cameras, instead of my usual Canon DSLR. This explains the different sizes and qualities of the pictures used for this post. Carrying a mobile to click pictures is so convenient and I think that in 2020, I will use it even more.

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