MIART 2017
By Alessandra Stefanini @ale_heloise
174 international galleries, 6 prizes and 3 days of talks with curators, critics, artists and museum directors: this is miart 2017, the centrepiece of the Milan Art Week.
The 22th edition of one of the most important art fairs in Italy has a new artistic director, Alessandro Rabottini, former vice-director of the past year and right-hand man of the former director, Vincenzo De Bellis, whose signature has made the fair the prestigious event we can enjoy today.
What makes miart unique is a constant yearly increase of well-known galleries participating for the first time and a section, called Object, totally dedicated to design galleries: like the Milanese Dimoregallery with its sparkling silver stand and a selection of very interesting pieces, such as the decorative Book, part of the Palmador project or the amazing Lamp 028 by Dimorestudio.
The fair is articulate in five other sections: On demand is the newest, with galleries showing context-based and site-specific works, like installations, wall paintings, commissions and performances, with the aim of seeing collecting art as a participating and active process.
The main section, Established, exhibit Masters and contemporary artist, meanwhile Emergent presents the most promising young artists. Generations and Decades, which is a sort of bird's eye view of the two souls of the event, the one dedicated to modern art and the second focused on the contemporary artist, complete the fair.
In a world dominated by images and social networks, the most Instagram-friendly and, therefore, the most photographed works are the neon lights, especially the ones with words of love, better if borrowed from songs, like the Joël Andrianomearisoa’s De son corps, de mon corps, de cet amour là, that quotes India song by Jeanne Moreau.
Many galleries presented beautiful masterpieces of the great Masters: such as Alighiero Boetti’s works on paper and tapestries, Piero Dorazio (especially the wonderful Miss Kayenta at the Cortesi Gallery) and Fausto Melotti with his Ritorno di Giuditta, quite different from the Botticelli’s one, but full of the same beauty and grace.
