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Eugenio Viola, an Italian in love with Latin art

“Addicted to the art drug” and a lover of Latin and Colombian talent. This is how Eugenio Viola defines himself, who was recently appointed as Curator of the Italy Pavilion 2022 for the 59th edition of the Art exhibition, the Venice Biennale.

The Italian is currently the chief curator of the Museum of Modern Art in Bogotá since 2019. A passionate about his profession who will represent his native country in this prestigious exhibition with his proposal chosen among 10 others.

“Viola is the bearer of a creative, ambitious and innovative vision, capable of thoroughly investigating the changes triggered by the pandemic in the country and in the world,” he said. Italy’s Minister of Culture Dario Franceschini, announcing his appointment.

In his carrer, Viola has curated more than 70 exhibitions around the world and has to her credit more than 50 publications, including books and catalogs.

Before living in Colombia, Viola was Senior Curator of PICA, The Perth Institute of Contemporary Arts in Perth, Western Australia, as well as Curator of the Madre Museum in Naples, from 2009 to 2016.

As a guest curator, he has collaborated with numerous international institutions, such as the Frankfurter Kunstverein, Germany; the CoCA, Center for Contemporary Art in Torun, Poland; EKKM, the Tallinn Museum of Contemporary Art and Tallinn Kunsthalle, in Estonia; PAC, Pavilion of Contemporary Art, Italy; the MSU, Museum of Contemporary Art of Croatia; and the MAMC, Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art of Saint-Étienne, in France.

The curator revealed to THE NEW CENTURY what his proposal will be about at the Venice Biennale, which will take place on April 23 next year and the biggest victories of his career.

THE NEW CENTURY: How do you start your history with the art world?

EUGENIO VIOLA: Since bambino I have always frequented all the museums and my infatuation with contemporary art came from the time of university.

TO US: What has curating meant for your life?

EV: The curatorship has given me the chance to get to know the world, travel, meet artists, see places before visiting them through the work of creators and living on three different continents.. Art is my life basically, it is an addiction, a drug. But it is the best.

I consider myself a special envoy of reality, here. I have a very ethical concept of my work, I am an activist and I make my point through what I expose on the walls of the Museum of Modern Art in Bogotá.

TO US: How does an Italian in love with Colombian and Latin art turn out?

EV: I am the curator of my generation who has worked with more Latin American artists before moving to Colombia. In addition, this is a country that has some extraordinary artists, from whom I also have a lot of material that I could work on aesthetically.

TO US: By becoming chief curator of the Mambo, did your perspective on Latin American art change?

EV: Yes, I have a more interior perspective because now I work within the Latin American system and that has given me the opportunity to contextualize the work of Colombian artists. I have also had the opportunity to meet many artists. So working at Mambo changed my perspective. What amazes me is the sheer number of talented artists. This is a country unfortunately with strong social wounds and contradictions, which is what we are experiencing in these confusing days.

TO US: What do you think the Mambo antidote has been to overcome the difficult situation left by the pandemic?

EV: Art cannot provide antidotes, but rather raises questions. I always say that the most interesting art is the one that does not answer you and leaves you more questions. There is no antidote, but the pandemic has shown us once again the importance of art. It is like this ‘meme’ that circulated on the networks, which said “think about your quarantine without books or movies”, it is impossible.

Our antidote, that of Mambo, was to come out with the first national artistic project to face the pandemic, Voice to voice, which was partly born around this time, publishing two artists a week as a collectible with works that have been conceived during the health emergency.

TO US: Now you are starting a new stage for your career at the Venice Biennale. What challenges will this curatorship entail?

EV: For me it is a great honor to represent my country after several years, although it is not the first time I have done it, because in 2015 I curated the pavilion of history. Obviously now it is different because it is the pavilion of my country. It is a new stage, it is a recognition of years of work. And the challenge is to present a work that dialectically confronts reality, which I try to do with all my curatorships.

TO US: What will your proposal consist of?

EV: It is a project that proposes a creative vision in our uncertain present. It is focused on the human being and the environment because the pandemic has basically imposed it on us, since it must be considered in a dramatic way. It also coincides with the relationship between man and territory, which was also the pillar of the first exhibition cycle of the Mambo, which had its focus on nature, landscape and territory, a relationship that is radically encoded in the style of Colombian artists, who work a lot in the landscape and I believe which is for two different but complementary reasons: the first that they have eleven different ecosystems that join the world and second, because all that nature was denied during the armed conflict. All of this has been my inspiration for the concept of my project for the Italian pavilion.

TO US: After the Biennale, what’s next for the Mambo?

EV: In August we will inaugurate the second exhibition cycle, which will be entirely dedicated to women, because as I love to declare, I am a gay and feminist curator.

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