Board of Directors’ Press Release. 19 March 2020

The new Board of Directors of La Biennale di Venezia took office today, chaired by Roberto Cicutto with members Luigi Brugnaro (Vice-President, Mayor of Venice and President of the Metropolitan City), Luca Zaia (President of the Regione Veneto), Claudia Ferrazzi (designated by the Minister for the Cultural Heritage and Activities and Tourism). The Board will remain in office for the four-year term 2020-2023.

After greeting the members of the Board – the meeting was also attended by Prof. Amerigo Restucci delegated by the President of the Regione Veneto – and the Board of Auditors, with members Jair Lorenco (President), Stefania Bortoletti and Anna Maria Como – who met online due to the current health emergency – President Roberto Cicutto stated: “The exceptional conditions under which we are beginning our work must compel us not only to find the best solutions to pursue La Biennale’s mission, in the interest of its international prestige, of the city of Venice and of our country, but above all to enrich it with new initiatives and new ideas for the dissemination of the contemporary arts. Nor can we forget La Biennale’s role as a factor in the growth and development of the city of Venice itself and of our nation.
I would like to thank Minister Dario Franceschini for the confidence with which he has honoured me by appointing me to lead La Biennale.
I would like to acknowledge and thank President Paolo Baratta, who leaves behind him a Biennale with a strong financial standing, and an unquestionable record of success.
I would like to thank the Parliamentary Commissions and their Presidents.
To the directors Marie Chouinard, Hashim Sarkis, Alberto Barbera, Ivan Fedele, Antonio Latella, I wish them well in their work.
The events of these days have led me to understand the extent to which the role of the Biennale may be to anticipate the present time and how artists and curators feel these ‘vibrations’. This is borne out by the title Hashim Sarkis has given to his Architecture Exhibition How will we live together?. It seems paradoxical that, as we are forced to remain physically separate, at the same time we are propelling an exponential growth in interpersonal relations via the new technologies. All of this cannot help but make us reflect on the indoor and outdoor spaces of our new coexistence.
I take this opportunity to commemorate the great master Vittorio Gregotti (to whom La Biennale owes so much), the tireless ‘thinker’ about social architecture, which is made of brick and mortar, but above all of relations.
These are all themes that, as we develop the work of the Historic Archives of the Contemporary Arts (ASAC), we will bring to the attention of professionals, as well as and especially of the greatest possible number of people”.

In today’s meeting the Board of Directors, which completed the procedures for taking office, proceeded to appoint Andrea Del Mercato to the position of Director General, a position he has long held with excellent results in terms of an efficient and cost-effective management, and for which he was selected on the basis of a specific new process.

The Board also thanked Debora Rossi, who has served as Deputy Director during one of the most problematic transition periods ever due to the current emergency. In addition to her current duties, she will also be responsible for the project for the New ASAC, which is of particular interest to the President, and aims to develop the potential of the Archive, as it expands the spaces it occupies, and to make it a point of reference for the permanent research activities involving every Department of La Biennale di Venezia; including the design and development of exhibitions, publications, communications, in the venues of La Biennale and elsewhere in Italy and abroad, in collaboration with the artistic directors and/or institutions such as universities, museums and archives working in the fields of expertise of La Biennale towards the enhancement of the contemporary arts.