Exhibition Review: CANVAS INTERNATIONAL ART FAIR
Venice | March 03/04 – March 25, 2022
THE ROOM Contemporary Art Space | ITSLIQUID ART SPACE – Venice Grand Canal

ITSLIQUID Group, in collaboration with Venice Events and EGO’ Boutique Hotel, is pleased to share the great success of the opening of CANVAS INTERNATIONAL ART FAIR, an international fair of photography, painting, video art, installation/sculpture, and performance art, held in Venice, at THE ROOM Contemporary Art Space from March 03 to March 25, 2022, and at ITSLIQUID ART SPACE – Venice Grand Canal, from March 04 to March 25, 2022, thanks to the participation of more than 100 artists coming from more than 30 countries worldwide.

Click here to read more about the press release
Click here to see the photo full reportage

CANVAS INTERNATIONAL ART FAIR consists of 3 main sections: THE SKIN PROJECT, OUT OF BALANCE and MIXING IDENTITIES.

The word “canvas” was used for the first time in Italy in the 14th century and it has become the most common support medium for oil painting, replacing wooden panels. During the centuries, the canvas’ meaning has changed, starting from paintings, through the photographic and cinematographic film, exploring the human body, to the digital world. Canvas is the creatives’ common ground, on which they can express themselves. We invite all the artists to share their personal artistic research through any kind of media, from painting to sculptures and installation, from photography to video art and live performance.

During the first opening event on March 03, we have been very pleased to receive many visitors and artists at THE ROOM Contemporary Art Space. Nathalie Bergeron Duval presented her series “Triangular Encounters”, three works made by acrylic and collage on canvas. The medium used is the most classical we know from the history of Art, as well as the main theme of this exhibition. Through it, the artist created an abstract vision of reality. Indeed the triangle represented in her works can be interpreted as a symbol of the human body: the two feet apart, anchored on the earth, and the head in contact with the sky. Mixing on the canvas, triangles seek to encounter each other, and to discover their own identities, as we do in life. Also, Kate Rossini in her “Chameleon series”, used a visual language based on abstraction, to create her acrylic and enamel canvases. Kate is a Londoner artist and her work is about exploring aspects of her own identity using surrealist techniques to access the subconscious mind. Themes running through her work include otherness, the feminine, totemic, the mask as a metaphor for identity, and she often works in repetition for its meditative and spiritual quality, using personal colour combinations that speak to her identity and interpretation of the world.

The artist Daniela Ferrero showed us how the ancient medium of Art and the realism on it, can nowadays share important and contemporary themes, as “The golden boy” does: the protagonist is the man, out of balance, who is no longer able to have an emotional exchange with his fellow men erased by the hidden power of computerization, that lands man between feelings and sensitivity to mere mathematical exploitation. Eleonora Bendi, starting from the medium used in her works, extended the concept of the canvas. Indeed she is an Italian documentary and architecture photographer, specialising in exploring the landscape and environmental issues, often with an emphasis on industrial areas, forms, and colours aesthetics. Talking about her artistic production, Elenora illustrated her vision of the works: “during the night, these buildings transcend their real dimension and appear as part of a bestiary or collection of fantasy creatures”. Thanks to photography she represented the buildings as a vestige of another time, part of contemporary mythology that she tried to put into the light on the post-industrial era.

Fabiana Privitera exhibited “Mar(e)mo series”, a photography series that explains how the human body and the skin, in particular, is able to communicate. Through different models of female beauty, she enhanced the scars as paint marks on our skin, because they are our victories, making us unique and unrepeatable. Digital painting is one of the key wolds in the field of contemporary art. During this exhibition Ewe Klimik‘s works were excellent examples of this type of media; indeed her artistic expression focuses on developing her newly known technique of digital painting. With her work, she invited the viewer to establish a connection based on a sense of security, wrapping the soul in a thirst for tenderness. It gives a chance to notice the subtle combination of story and colours and to get lose oneself in another reality for a while. At the same time, Akane Hiraoka‘s digital painting showed us not only a new way to express through Art but also a new type of beauty model, as her “Narcissus”, a colourful half man half monster, do.

During the opening, we had the pleasure to host the presentation of the Tania Ursomarzo collection of shoes: TRIPTYCH footwear is designed in New York City and 100% handmade in Milan in limited editions. A niche investment product for the art and design-conscious who express individuality through thoughtful, unique objects for the body. Among the photographer taking part in this exhibition, there is Hilda Champion a German/American fine art photographer. Hilda uses the camera, as a canvas, so as a tool to express ideas and emotions. Sometimes she records “reality”, but mostly perceived reality. Her aspiration in photography is less about showing the world as it is, but rather to release the poetry of the ordinary and help people see the unseen. To explain her philosophy, she affirmed that her images are “based on a true fantasy”.

At ITSLIQUID ART SPACE – Venice Grand Canal, on March 04, we hosted a very touching live performance by Sergio Patricio and Sara Hawy. Sara and Sergio visualized dystopian scenarios of the future in a performative way to underline the seriousness of the current political situation and reflect a glimmer of hope through the effect of “activism”. The result of their artistic research and collaboration was a futuristic vision of a world after the outbreak of World War III and a nuclear catastrophe. As the last survivors, Sara and Sergio played as couriers of a message from the future returning to the present, to warn of the possible mass extinction. The Austrian Bel Infeld, the Italian Fabio Zuglian, and the Iranian Hafez Miraftabi presented all colourful paintings on canvas, in very different ways. Bel Infeld‘s works invited the viewers to put themselves in the picture with their emotions and to immerse in a world beyond the reality of their everyday life. Indeed he affirmed that “painting is not just starting with a brush on the canvases, it is much more a science in which, as an avant-garde artist, you often have to destroy all elements of the materials and techniques in order to create great, fascinating works”. Fabio Zuligan, a self-taught artist, experimented with different techniques and particularly played with colours. The portraits presented during this exhibition, expressed feelings, a set of lines and colours that enhanced unique and iconic characters.

Conversely, Hafez Miraftabi‘s works laid their foundations on the Swiss psychoanalyst Carl Jung, who changed the conversation on psychology forever when he proposed his theory on archetypes and the collective unconscious. The artists affirmed that “I have incorporated some Jungian archetypes in my work; most of my work centred around the nature of the archetypal symbolism like fighter, hero, magician, Wiseman, lover and so on. These ideas are connected with Postmodernism.” The French-born Vietnamese painter Laurence Antignac told us how she is fascinated by the tension between the painter’s thought process and the painting’s own power, and how her works live for the dizziness of this unpredictable confrontation. Laurence joined the exhibitions showing two oil paintings under the theme Out of Balance, that she created during the first lockdown in March 2020 in Paris. “Lockdown 1” and “Lockdown 2” represent women going through mixed feelings: seclusion, fear, threat, and alternatively hope, joy, freedom.

Far from the figurative are the “Berlin Reinvented series” by Oliver Stephens, a series of paintings depicting the ever-evolving architecture of one of Europe’s most controversial, influential, and tragic capitals, Berlin. In this exploration, he attempted to peel back the layers of history to better understand the city. “Still dancing II ” and “Emergence” are the titles of the elegant Rebecca Ainscough‘ sculptures. In these works, the physical human form tells the story of the emotional landscape that lies within; a landscape that cannot always be seen by the eye alone. Rebecca’s work aims to capture the moments that lie between untold stories. In this place, where one story ends and another begins to unfold, she invited the viewer to experience the inner world of another person. Eman Alshawaf is a Kuwaiti artist whose work focuses on the use of digital tools to create experimental expressions. Her works are the results of a mix of mediums such as photography, video, prints, and projections. In her installation she explored the impact of contemporary computer technology on language and the human experience and is also interested in the construction of beliefs, memories, inspecting how the past influences our present.

In addition, the exhibition’s concept was well enhanced through a selection of video artworks, such as Melanja Palitta‘s “Resistenza”. She developed her love for filmmaking as a result of her necessity to find balance during her transition from dance into the new digital visual world. Her work focused on the process that drives us to make decisions and the different, and often opposite factors, that shape them. All artists that took part in CANVAS International Art Fair contributed to explaining how the canvas’ meaning has changed through history and all the contemporary ways of expression are new systems to share their personal and community artistic research.

organized by ITSLIQUID Group
curator Luca Curci
in collaboration with Venice Events and EGO’ Boutique Hotel
project manager Giulia Tassi
project coordinators Amaride Ferrante, Veronica Piras, Giulia Spagnuolo
collaborators Francesca Clementi, Elisabetta Eliotropio, Ilaria Falchetti, Federica Pagin, Benedetta Reale
graphic designer Francesca Di Lauro
supported by BIG HORN | ENKI EYEWEAR | FABIO ZUGLIAN ART | MARIA ODDY | PIRAEUS BANK | WWWH

VENUES
THE ROOM Contemporary Art Space
Calle Larga San Marco, 374 – 30124 Venice, Italy
March 04 – March 25, 2022
09:30AM – 05:30PM | Monday – Friday

ITSLIQUID ART SPACE – Venice Grand Canal
Palazzo Bembo, first floor
Riva del Carbon, 4793 – 4785, 30124 Venice, Italy
March 07 – March 25, 2022
09:30AM – 05:30PM | Monday – Friday

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COVID-19 Protection Concept – ITSLIQUID Group

The health and safety of our staff and visitors are of predominant importance to ITSLIQUID Group. This Protection Concept governs how we intend to operate after Italy’s lockdown has ended, the rules that will be applied inside the exhibition spaces and how these will be implemented in practice. Read more.

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ABOUT US

ITSLIQUID is a web-based information platform, founded in 2001 by Luca Curci, dedicated to the worldwide distribution of information about calls for entries, exhibitions, and events at some of the world’s leading art galleries, museums, and foundations selected. ITSLIQUID has already built a readership of more than 250.000 qualified subscribers. Among them architects, designers, artists, collectors, art critics, curators, dealers, and other personalities of the International art, architecture and design world. It provides advertising services, press office services for events and projects, articles and specials published on the website, media partnerships services.

During the last 20 years, ITSLIQUID Group has become a cultural hub between creatives, exhibition spaces, and art lovers. Among our international partners, Art Now Fair, Art Vancouver, Design Tokyo, INDEX Qatar, INDEX Saudi, The Big 5 Construct Dubai, The Big 5 Construct Qatar, Photo LA Los Angeles, and international magazines like Art Style. ITSLIQUID Group supports some of the most important no-profit organizations, like UNFCCC – United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, SSCS – Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, One Tree Planted, The Ocean CleanUp and Plastic Oceans, with the goal to increase public awareness about environmental issues. Click here to find out more.

ITSLIQUID GROUP includes a section dedicated to the organization of international art events, managing exhibitions of painting, photography, video art, installation and performance; it organizes solo and collective shows, art residencies and international contests. Its object is to use new technologies to globalize the language of art, to connect artists working in every part of the world.

ITSLIQUID Group manages a variety of art spaces all over the world; among them THE ROOM Contemporary Art Space in the heart of San Marco Square in Venice and different historical buildings, THE LINE Contemporary Art Space in London city centre, and other different partners worldwide. Since its beginning, the group has organized more than 250 events all around the world, involving more than 5.000 artists, in more than 60 international venues in Italy, the USA, Canada, UK, Spain, France, etc. Most of the last events have been realized in museums (CCCB – Centre de Cultura Contemporània de Barcelona in Spain, NCCA – National Center for Contemporary Arts in Moscow, etc.), galleries, and private foundations.

ITSLIQUID is based on fluidity, motion, connection, and accessibility. Making things easy to do. Welcome.

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OUR LOCATIONS

THE ROOM Contemporary Art Space, located in San Marco square, in the heart of Venice is available to host solo shows and group exhibitions of the most talented emerging and established artists, designers, and architects selected by our professional team among the numerous show participation requests.

Overlooking the unique San Marco square, THE ROOM Contemporary Art Space presents a rich program of exhibitions, talks, meetings, workshops, and courses about art, architecture, design, and fashion with architects, designers, artists, collectors, art critics, curators, dealers, and other personalities of the International art, architecture and design world. Being part of our program is an exciting opportunity to improve your network and get new inspirations.

THE ROOM Contemporary Art Space is a fascinating and prestigious venue where our professional team will be at your disposal to assist you, offering a unique exhibition experience, giving you the opportunity to display your artworks in Venice, one of the most suggestive cities in the art world, and broadening your artistic career and exhibition background.

ITSLIQUID ART SPACE – Venice Grand Canal, based on the first floor of Palazzo Bembo located in the historic district of San Marco, the heart of Venice, is available to host solo shows and group exhibitions of the most talented emerging and established artists, designers, and architects selected by our professional team among the numerous show participation requests.

Palazzo Bembo is one of the late Gothic Venetian buildings built in the right middle of the famous Canal Grande, a few meters from the renowned Rialto Bridge. Its name comes from the humanist and literary cardinal Pietro Bembo, known for the so-called “linguistic question” during the Italian XV century.

The facade of the building, with all its gothic pentafore, is as fascinating as the interior which is divided into three floors and characterized by large salons. The seventeenth-century staircase overlooks the internal courtyard that leads to the noble floor, where decorations are dating back to the same century, in Baroque style. The exhibition space, on the first floor, overlooks the Canal Grande and the Rialto Bridge, giving a suggestive view both day and night.