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Adventures of Enlightenment is the project by the clebrated German director and producer Alexander Kluge realised for Palazzo Diedo as part of the international panel What is Unversalism? organised by the Berggruen Institute Europe.

The project consists of eight monochannel videos, his famous Minutefilms, short hybrid compositions lasting only a few minutes, a pinboard with visual and textual references which, according to his typical eclectic and fluid methodology - and aesthetics - aims to stimulate reflection and free associations of the audience, and a set of playing cards.
In the eight Minutenfilms along the main hall of Palazzo Diedo, ranging from cosmology to mathematics, from science to art history, Kluge offers an often ironic but frank social commentary on historical and contemporary events. His Minutefilms are a unique way of filmmaking in which complex ideas are condensed into a few minutes. To achieve this, the director uses highly idiosyncratic editing methods, in which images and sounds are sourced from a wide variety of sources and collaborations.

Specially produced for this occasion Adventures of Enlightenment A set of 40 cards on error or value in Universalism is a set of cards that winks at the practice of tarots. The forty cards are a free intellectual and visual journey on the possibility/opportunity of the persistence of universal concepts. They serve as anchors for the fragmented compositions of the videos - including a Tribute to Venice - and include various collaborations from Katerina Grosse to George Baselitz, reworkings, superimpositions and even interpretations made with artificial intelligence, and above all images extracted from Aby Warburg's famous Mnemosyne Atlas, from which he takes up the dynamic between word and image.

In the end, the pinborad is a clearly didactic tool, particularly suited to the former Palazzo Diedo primary schools, offering the public the opportunity to dwell on the myriad of stimuli on offer.
With this methodology, Kluge aims to activated the participation of the viewer, considering the spectator the true medium of his artistic practice.

Yes we can - public talk between the Ghanaian artist Ibrahim Mahama, one of the protagonists of the Janus exhibition currently underway, and Ibrahima Lo, a young Senegalese/Venetian writer and human rights activist, who for a few months worked in Palazzo Diedo as cultural mediator.

The meeting will be moderated by the curator of Palazzo Diedo, Adriana Rispoli.

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Ibrahim Mahama’s work is currently featured in Palazzo Diedo’s inaugural exhibition, Janus. The permanent work, Three Little Birds (2023) takes inspiration from visual materials around the artist's studio Red Clay in Ghana. From school pupils witnessing the building of a railway line to families using the laid infrastructure of the line as a platform for a family portrait, the lines and production system around it establish creative platforms for reimagining the body in relation to history. The work reimagines the prevailing conditions of a given society while proposing future forms.

Ibrahim Mahama’s artistic practice is characterised by the use of materials collected from urban environments - wood remnants, paper documents and jute sacks - which he manipulates and transforms to explore themes such as the phenomenon of globalisation and migration and the trade in goods. The materials are stitched together like tapestries and draped over architectural structures often related to consumer societies. Mahama says, "I am interested in how crisis and failure are absorbed into this material, with a strong reference to the global transaction and the functioning of capitalist structures". In Mahama's work, jute sacks are thus used as a metaphor for the fragility of Ghana's commercial markets. His works are often made in collaboration with Ghanaian citizens, artists, architects and technicians.

Ibrahima Lo has also worked at Palazzo Diedo as a cultural mediator. Lo lost his mother at 10 and his father at 15, and as an only child decided to leave Senegal to fulfil his dreams. He found the ‘easy’ trip to Europe he’d been told of to be much more brutal. Having crossed the desert and being incarcerated, moving around several prisons, Lo crossed the sea in a rubber dinghy carrying 120 migrants and landed in Italy. First in Bari, then Puglia, Belluno and finally in Venice where he settled.

Lo published his autobiography, Pane e Acqua: Dal Senegal all’Italia passando per la Libia (Bread and Water: From Senegal to Italy via Libya), in 2021. The book became one of the stories that inspired Matteo Garrone’s 2023 film Io capitano (I Captain). In 2024 Lo published his second book, La mia voce – Dalle rive dell’Africa alle strade d’Europa (My voice – From the shores of Africa to the streets of Europe). Both of Lo’s books were published by Villaggio Maori. He is also visiting schools and universities to talk to students and is meeting with magistrates, representatives of European institutions, and filmmakers to discuss his experience.

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This will be a discussion between the famous Japanese artist and the celebrated Italian philosopher, professor of Philosophy of Religion at the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales in Paris, known for his interdisciplinary philosophical research that touches on topics such as plant metaphysics and the arts.
During the event, the speakers will explore themes linked to art and “philosophy”, on the occasion of the new installation Peace Crystal in the garden of Palazzo Corner della Ca' Granda. The work is by Mariko Mori, an artist who knows how to fuse technology and digital language with the rediscovery of man's ancestral roots, as well as an awareness of the theme of equality between peoples and the  protection of nature.

Moderated by Adriana Rispoli, Palazzo Diedo's curator

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On the occasion of Art Night Venezia 2024, the famous Swiss art curator Hans Ulrich Obrist will entertain the public with the marathon of conversations and performances entitled: “What is Universalism?”, an event curated together with Lorenzo Marsili, Director of the Berggruen Institute Europe.

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Participants: Frédérique Ait-Touati, Barbara Cassin, Emanuele Coccia, Souleymane Bachir Diagne, Mamadou Diouf, Manthia Diawara, Arturo Escobar, Yuk Hui, Nadia Yala Kisukidi, Margaret Levi, Julie Mehretu, Pankaj Mishra, Carlo Rovelli, Nikolaj Schultz, Song Bing, Ece Temelkuran, Ge Wang, Zhang Xudong.

There will be also:

Venice Inclined Oval Staircase by Carsten Höller - opening

performance by Holly Herndon & Mat Dryhurst

presentation of the project “Adventures of Enlightenment” by Alexander Kluge, curated by Hans Ulrich Obrist and Adriana Rispoli

“Are universals “precious stones of thought”? Are they tools? Are they constellations of stars that help people lost in the night to orientate? Or are they tarot cards?
The world of universals is an unfinished project. Real people live in its ruins. Universals can be represented as buildings that are still being worked on and also as benevolent ghosts that wander around the globe and hope to be born. Universals need a lot of fortune” Alexander Kluge.

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On June 22, for Art Night Venezia 2024, JANUS exhibition at Palazzo Diedo will be open 5 pm to 12 am, last entry 11 pm

INFO Berggruen Institute Europe