Visions of Beauty

In coincidence with the 60th Venice Art Biennale, ‘La Galleria’, the Italian branch of Galerie Dorothea van der Koelen in Mainz (Germany), is presenting works by 8 international artists from 6 countries in the exhibition ‘Visions of Beauty’ from April 19 to November 24, 2024: Lore Bert (D), Daniel Buren (F), Mohammed Kazem (UAE), Joseph Kosuth (USA), Nam Tchun-Mo (ROK), Fabrizio Plessi (I), Turi Simeti (I) and Günther Uecker (D).

My gallery in Mainz is celebrating its 45th birthday this year – La Galleria Venezia has been around for 23 years – and I thought long and hard about what the theme of this year’s exhibition could be. When I realized what horrors are happening in our world right now – the wars in the Middle East as well as Ukraine/Russia and in Yemen and many other places, hunger, climate change, the disasters caused by climate change, floods, hot forest fires, fissures in the earth, volcanic eruptions, melting ice, the energy crisis, the loss of human dignity and compassion, and the loss of human dignity and compassion – so I thought: we have to set a counter-model with art. We have to use art to offer a forum, to create a level on which we can be happy despite all these adversities. And what can offer us this forum? Beauty. I am convinced that it is not a nice side effect of art, but its determinant. Looking at beautiful art makes our soul beautiful. The concept of beauty is unanimously associated with something good and positive: a nice experience, a nice dinner, thank you …
So I named the exhibition ‘Visions of Beauty’. Because I want to take people into a world that is not characterized by these horrors, that has nothing destructive about it, that offers no sex, no crime, no kitsch, but takes them into a world full of beauty, full of peace, full of freedom of thought, into a world of art in which they can go for a walk with their imagination.

Dorothea van der Koelen

We are showing works by Lore Bert, Daniel Buren, Mohammed Kazem, Joseph Kosuth, Nam Tchun-Mo, Fabrizio Plessi, Turi Simeti and Günther Uecker – 8 artists from 6 countries.

An important glass work in magenta from the cycle Cadre décadré by the French artist Daniel Buren is on display, which is connected with the exhibition at the Guggenheim Museum in New York in 2005.

Lore Bert, the globally active paper artist from Germany, presents her latest creations with Japanese paper and gold leaf, which were only completed a few weeks ago and show completely new aspects such as Art Deco elements.

The Emirati star Mohammed Kazem from Dubai has created the new light work Collecting Waves especially for the gallery and exhibition, which can be seen together with one of his typical Directions scratches.

We are presenting a philosophical masterpiece by the American inventor of ‘Conceptual Art’ Joseph Kosuth, which deals with Wittgenstein’s late work, his language games.

Fabrizio Plessi, the Italian Venetian by choice and pioneer of video art, has created the touching video sculpture Mosaico Veneziano, which is inspired by the gold mosaics of San Marco and conveys a floating state.

The Korean Dansaekhwa artist Nam Tchun-Mo is not only showing his typical Beam works in blue and red this time, but also a wonderful large-format Spring work in gold corresponding to Fabrizio Plessi.

From the Sicilian and Italian ZERO artist Turi Simeti we can present a magnificent masterpiece in red, showing 12 ovali arranged in a square.

The German ZERO artist Günther Uecker is represented with the flowing and dynamic embossed print Strömung, which is thematically very well suited to the lagoon city.

Of course, these artists, who all work and exhibit very internationally, are Foreigners everywhere – as the title of this year’s Venice Biennale says – but with this un-anecdotal and un-illustrative we are not trying to emphasize the differences, but to build bridges for the ‘dialogue of cultures’ against the ‘dialogue of weapons’.

We hope that we will soon be able to welcome you to our premises in the lagoon city and guide you through the exhibition. You will find us in the heart of the city, at the back of the famous ‘Teatro La Fenice’, in the San Marco district, Calle Calegheri 2566

www.vanderkoelen.de
lagalleria@vanderkoelen.de
tel. +39 - 327 - 692 3 693.