As we all know, last April (on the 27th), the second edition of CONNEXXION, the Scattered Contemporary Art Festival promoted by the Arteam Cultural Association came to an end in Savona, the city running as Italian Capital of Culture 2027. The Festival was entirely designed by Livia Savorelli who, for the occasion, not only curated a rich, wide-ranging programme of events, but also focused our attention on a refined space for human reflection (i.e. freedom). This is something which is difficult to forget and needs to be renewed as a revolutionary idea, a horizontal exchange, a space for wholesome divergent thinking and, at the same time, a horizon of memory, a terrain of resistance, an ideological anchor where concepts such as identity, hospitality, diversity or otherness find a fit collocation, illuminated among other things by the milky way of culture, democracy and kindness.
“The title of the second edition of CONNEXXION,” strongly supported by Mayor Marco Russo, Councillor Nicoletta Negro and Urban Regeneration Councillor Ilaria Becco, is “…to be free. Between identity and memory and aims to stimulate a wide-ranging reflection on the concept of freedom, in a world increasingly affected by nationalism, authoritarian drifts, wars and planetary upheavals, along with an accentuated drive towards radicalism and extremism,” reads the press material.
Divided into two clearly defined (but interconnected) parts and organised in various public spaces in the city, …to be free was an event in which the fabric of history (among the various episodes of the story several partisan women from Savona were also remembered – Clelia Corradini, Ines Negri, Franca Lanzone, Paola Garelli and Luigia Comotto) was interwoven with the urban sphere through monumental, immersive installations or with specific ad hoc works. An engaging itinerary, capable of taking care of the places and those who live them in their pulsating everyday life was also designed, moving between Agenore Fabbri’s Resistance Monument (where Silvia Margaria’s performance Bandite, took place on 20 April and was realised with the participation of the Castell’Alfero Palio Committee flag wavers) and the breathtaking Priamàr Fortress, where we enjoyed two timely exhibitions at the Civic Archaeological Museum and the Sandro Pertini and Renata Cuneo Museum (Fragments. Acts of preservation for a future of freedom and Dialogues around Freedom).
Let us now consider the concluding event of this great art festival of talks, performances, prizes – the Arteam Cup 2023 is in its eighth edition – and engaging projects (it is worth mentioning the installation Semi (Seeds) by Davide Dormino, “located on the lawn close to the external archaeological area, north of the fortress”). The curator expressed a strong desire to use the former Convent of Sant’Agostino as an additional location. This had been a prison from the beginning of the 19th century until 2016 where a number of well-known anti-fascists such as Ferruccio Parri, Carlo Rosselli and Sandro Pertini had also been detained. The latter has been locked up in an extremely damp, inhospitable cell for two brief periods between 22 and 27 May 1925, and then on the night between 11 and 12 September 1941. Here the works by the following artists were on display: Alessio Barchitta, Rocco Dubbini, Armida Gandini, Federica Gonnelli, Lorenzo Gnata, Monica Gorini (extraordinary The garden within. Poetics of Freedom, an immersive installation that transforms a painful cell into a lush garden) and Carla Iacono (the universe that transpires from her Education to Memory is poignant). For the concluding event, Gianni Moretti, Giulia Nelli and Filippo Riniolo offered significant reflections on the “concepts of freedom, memory and identity” which not only initiate a process of regeneration and “renewed functionality” of architecture today, but also open up an anticipated adventure: CONNEXXION 2024, yet to be designed…, and written.
Connexion. Festival di arte diffusa, Savona, 20-27.04.2024
images: (cover 1) Davide Dormino, Semi, Special project per Connexxion, Fortezza del Priamàr, Savona, 2024. Ph. Carola Spina (2) Silvia Margaria, Bandite, Special project per Connexxion, Ex Carcere Sant’Agostino, Savona, 2024. Ph. Michele Alberto Sereni (3-4) Armida Gandini, Il n° 34 e il n° 27, installazione site-specific per Connexxion, Ex Carcere Sant’Agostino, Savona, 2024. Ph. Michele Alberto Sereni (5) Monica Gorini, Il giardino dentro. Poetica della libertà, installazione site-specific per Connexxion, Ex Carcere Sant’Agostino, Savona, 2024. Ph. Michele Alberto Sereni
