Exhibition Review: THE BODY LANGUAGE 2022
Venice | January 27/28 – February 18, 2022
THE ROOM Contemporary Art Space | ITSLIQUID ART SPACE – Venice Grand Canal

ITSLIQUID Group, in collaboration with Venice Events and EGO’ Boutique Hotel, is proud to share the incredible success of the opening of THE BODY LANGUAGE 2022, an international exhibition of photography, painting, video art, installation/sculpture, and performance art, held in Venice, at THE ROOM Contemporary Art Space from January 27 to February 18, 2022, and at ITSLIQUID ART SPACE – Venice Grand Canal from January 28 to February 18, 2022, with the participation of around 130 artists from more than 30 different countries worldwide.

Click here to see the photo full reportage

THE BODY LANGUAGE analyzes the hidden parts of our identities, through an immersive experience inside the fascinating universe of the complex labyrinths of our consciousness. The human body is a changing system that connects us with other bodies and spaces to perceive the surrounding reality; a strong communication system with its own language and infinite ways of expression. We invite artists to explore the connection between desires, needs, fears through rituals that bring humankind to change, to transform, and to evolve their inner world.

Speaking about inner evolution, during the opening event at THE ROOM Contemporary Art Space on January 27, Christian Burnham and Cristian Diez Sanchez explained to us the change of their lives and art in the years. Christian Burnham, self-taught artist who travelled a lot in his life, presented four colourful artworks made by mixing different techniques such as spray paint, stencils and realistic images. This very personal style is the result of his love for art, which gave him the strength to overcome a bad period of alcohol addiction after many years as a professional motocross rider. His rehabilitation started from art and painting, through which he rediscovered the inner mechanics of his creative conscience. Cristian Diez Sanchez talked to us about his life, spent between Chile and Spain as a designer before dedicating to art in the very last few years. This change in his career was because he felt the urgency of communicating the violence of the world we live in through the sculpture medium. The prototypes he creates with recycled cardboard boxes and acrylic paint represent stylized figures that are awaiting their Fate; they make us recall the prisoners brutally executed live streaming in front of the whole world, a terrifying moment to be seen as if it were a movie, everything perfectly staged, perfectly assembled. The body is totally surrendered to another human being driven by his evil feelings.

Even Ferenc Monostori’s sculptures, made with the ancient traditional technique of wax losing bronze casting, are halfway between the despair and the resurrection of men. They look like bodies in motion, pervaded by the vital spirit that can be positive or negative at the same time. David Jacobson, an English artist who currently lives and works between Italy and the UK, as well reflects on the theme of human life, death and time with his two wall installations. “Bible Teeth Time” is the perfect summary of the human experience, because it is composed of the mythology of the religion, the teeth as the last remaining source of our DNA and the time that goes on and never stops, marking our existence. While ”7 Confections” is a kind of illusory will of the artist himself and is, indeed, the deconstruction of the artist’s life. The installation consists of sketchbooks and diaries bound, sealed and glued together, to prevent them from being read, and it reveals to us the problematic nature of the accessibility of all our personal information with modern technology.

Many other selected artists focused on the concept of the transformations of the body. The Japanese photographer Masaki Hirokawa, for example, exhibited a series of works in which the editing process brought the subjects closer to the imagination rather than reality. The realistic women bodies portrayed acquired a sense of divinity and spirituality through the addition of gold paint, bird masks and wings’ feathers which are symbols of the human will survive ad reborn in front of the worst situations. Oonagh Quinn’s subjects as well are women bodies and personalities. The aim of the young British painter is a more accurate representation of the female form. In a society where women are constantly criticised and judged by their appearance, it is necessary to normalise bodies that do not conform to common expectations of beauty. Her muses are depicted in comfortable poses and environments, thus they are unbothered by the viewer and its intrusion.

For Sabine Windischbauer, from Austria, the main characters of her creations are the colours. She painted on every kind of support and chooses the colours in a mostly intuitive way since she thinks that they have frequencies as sounds, and can somehow communicate with our heart instead of our ears. Each work has its own language. Last but not least, Dominika Kock, of Poland origin, participated with her “portraits of the soul”, as she calls them, that are created in her head through her emotions. She tried to transposes on the canvas the human passion and spontaneity, and thus developed her own technique, which allow her to show the inner feelings that she could never put into words.

For the second opening of THE BODY LANGUAGE 2022, on January 28 we presented to the public our new amazing location: ITSLIQUID ART SPACE – Venice Grand Canal, a historical building facing the Grand Canal with its big esaphor. We welcomed the visitors to the luxurious salons and showed to them an incredible variety of works. Rea Boschi, for example, exhibited her unique sculpted jewellery, elegant and feminine, that enrich the main salon of the venue. Maria Jose Godoy Majo introduced us to her photo series by explaining the concept behind the shooting: she wanted to immortalize the tenderness and delicacy of everyday gestures, but the men and women she chose as models are completely covered by tattoos, symbols of strength and fortress. The contrasts between these two sides of the human being are the photographer’s core element. Jacqueline H-Botquelen participated with several glass artworks, mainly done with the “pâte de verre” technique, fused images, painting and light in a quest to express the artist’s thoughts. Her focus is the origin of Humanity, which we all share, going from the non-acceptance of others to the cultural appropriation and integration of those ‘others’ beliefs, ritual outfits, etc., in our everyday life. We all share the same legacy, our roots are the continuity of the generations.

Barbara Gundlach had one of the many rooms of the palace entirely dedicated to her project. She presented a two-channel video installation with her simultaneously videos “Memory of a coma I & II”, which draw the emotional and neurological link between the fear of forgetting, and the poetry of death. Related to that kind of research, the site-specific installation “Organ”, made of wooden trunks, as well confronts the eternal synergy between destruction and evolution, life and death, the reappropriation of memory and history, and questions monetary value systems. Adrianne Gojak‘s work is all centred on the movement, and as it influences her to create, she also needs the change among different media – painting, drawing, collages and graphic art – and then she comes back to photography. In photography, she captures the moment that feels right for her and the different perspectives, and in the process, she looks closely at how colours, shapes and textures interact and transform it into something new depending on the combination.

Una Marzorati (unamarz) and Lynn Jaanz once again took part in one of our events. Una Marzorati (unamarz) this time showed a whole collection of her dreamlike artworks made with paper origami on canvas; her artistic work is inspired by the observation of the world around her, she is particularly inspired by nature and her inner world – dreams and visions during meditation – and she uses origami as cells that form different organisms. Lynn Jaanz, the Australian established artist, showed her three abstract paintings realized on the concept of movement and evolution. “Movement is a part of life as we strive are pulled and disperse our spirit in many directions hoping to find peace and meaning”, she states, and all her works represent enlightenment, breakthrough and hope for those moments of desperation and struggle in our lives. Steven’Gb-yega Fajana, a multidisciplinary artist, through his double participation with a video work and a photo, highlighted the visual narrative nuance by employing the available medium as a vessel to convey his story for each art piece. His identity, split between his African origin and his current life in London, surely influenced his multiple artistic approaches and tries to take out his two souls. Besides him, other video artists projected their videos in our rich screening program, and during the opening day at ITSLIQUID ART SPACE – Venice Grand Canal the big salons hosted also two live performances by Adela Filipovic, from Croatia, focused on the illusionary transformation of a fish in a woman, and by MY PLACE, from Italy, who make all the visitors reflect on the body as a liminal, individual but also collective space.  

organized by ITSLIQUID Group
curator Luca Curci
in collaboration with Venice Events, EGO’ Boutique Hotel
project manager Giulia Tassi
project coordinators Amaride Ferrante, Veronica Piras, Giulia Spagnuolo
collaborators Federica Lapi, Martina Melica, Giulia Morroni, Grazia Rosa, Michela Sperandio
graphic designer Marina Caracciolo, Francesca Di Lauro
supported by BURO TOP ADVISEURS | DIGITAL TREE | K.L. ELECTRO | NATALIE SOBO ART | SASHA ASSAUL DESIGN

VENUES
THE ROOM Contemporary Art Space
Calle Larga San Marco, 374 – 30124 Venice, Italy
January 28 – February 18, 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
January 31 – February 18, 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.