During its initial years the Fondazione per l’Arte has engaged in a variety of methods for supporting artists, particularly young artists, through various kinds of project. With the aim of developing a more planned and targeted activity, the Foundation’s opening of a large headquarters offers enormous potential, both on account of its architectural space and its particular location, rooted in the artisanal heartland of the district. With the opening of its headquarters in the Mandrione the Foundation has initiated an ‘intellectual workshop’ of national and international experts in various disciplines committed to an all-embracing project that aims to support and sustain the visual arts. Through its programming its objective is also to engage, the related arts of, say, theatre, music and architecture.
A primary avenue of research is already clear: the Foundation’s ‘operational workshop’ is taking form through a series of collective residency projects specifically addressing the exploration of the volatile and multi-faceted emerging Italian art scene. The intention is both to restore a platform of visibility and to offer the possibility of meeting and competing with European peers on the international art scene. This point of departure is determined by the climate of recent years whereby artist-run spaces have with courage and determination generated the progress of creative research. The focus is therefore on the studio and all those practices that contribute to the creation of an artwork – the objective being to generate dynamic exchanges between artists, curators and the public. The exhibition space is, on each occasion, transformed into a place of dynamic, formative, growth – a laboratory where groups of invited artists can measure up to one another revealing their connections, filling some of the gaps in our cultural landscape and inviting new modes of interpretation, above all broadening the horizon of ideas.
Furthermore by exploring the relationship between the artist and the place in which he works – in this particular case the city of Rome and the Mandrione district – it is hoped the revaluation of the area will be favoured.
Fundamental to the Foundation’s identity is its characterisation as a determined centre of research, production and discourse on art, intent on engaging an ever growing public, drawing it into exploring richly experimental content and all those precious thought processes of planning and creation that ferment in the art world. This objective would see the Foundation’s spaces transformed into a great laboratory, studio to every artist, a work place for critics and curators, and a space capable of engaging and stimulating the eye of the public, helping to draw visitors closer to the work of art through the organisation of initiatives such as workshops, talks, open studio events and studio visits.
The idea of an ‘operational workshop’ that is always open, always dynamic, has come into being to provide artists a platform for greater visibility and a meeting point offering the opportunity of national and international exchanges with other artists, dealers, critics, curators, museum directors, collectors and the public.