The Venice Biennale has announced the theme of its upcoming 60th International Art Exhibition, which will take place from 20 April to 24 November 2024 (pre-opening 17, 18, 19 April) at the Giardini, the Arsenale and various venues around Venice.
Entitled Stranieri Ovunque – Foreigners Everywhere, the exhibition will explore the figure of the ‘outsider’ in all its forms, othered by nationality, race, gender, sexuality or wealth. Adriano Pedrosa, curator of the 60th edition, explains: “The Biennale Arte 2024 will focus on artists who are themselves foreigners, immigrants, expatriates, diasporic, émigrés, exiled, and refugees—especially those who have moved between the Global South and the Global North.”
The biennale’s title is drawn from a series of works by Palermo-based collective Claire Fontaine, that consists of neon sculptures in different colours that spell out the phrase ‘Foreigners Everywhere’ in different languages. The work, in turn, is named after a Turin-based anarchist and anti-racist collective, Stranieri Ovunque.
Pedrosa adds: “The phrase ‘Foreigners Everywhere’ has (at least) a dual meaning. First of all, that wherever you go and wherever you are you will always encounter foreigners—they/we are everywhere. Secondly, that no matter where you find yourself, you are always, truly, and deep down inside, a foreigner.”
This theme will constitute the main focus of the exhibition and unfold in the Nucleo Contemporaneo. The biennale will also feature a Nucleo Storico bringing together works from 20th-century Latin America, Africa, the Arab world, and Asia. A special section of the Nucleo Storico will be dedicated to the Italian artistic diaspora across these regions and Europe.
