Avant-Garde in the Desert: Images, Textiles, Sounds, Words

This year the Ca’ Foscari’s focus for ArtNight hinges on the major exhibition Uzbekistan: the Avant-Garde in the Desert, the first exhibition in the West of masterpieces from the Museums of Tashkent and Nukus. An exceptional event, which also fits pertinently into the vast framework of the Marco Polo centenary celebrations, emphasising a hitherto unprecedented aspect of the cultural dialogue between East and West: starting with the exhibition, ArtNight 2024 emphasises essential aspects and enriches the enjoyment of the exhibition with specific events. This is the sense of the programme Avant-Garde in the Desert: Images, Textiles, Sounds, Words.

Event schedule

6pm
Start: Opening of the gates and free distribution of gadgets. 
Closing time: 1am

6:30pm
Exhibition spaces, Find Me! The Avant-Garde in the Desert—Ca’arte Lab
Workshop for everyone. Students from Ca’ Foscari conduct a special workshop open to both adults and children. A treasure hunt among the extraordinary works of the exhibition hosted in the university’s exhibition spaces. 
Booking required: cartelab [​at​] unive.it

10pm 
New distribution of free gadgets

10:30pm
Main courtyard, The Avant-Garde in the Desert: images, textiles, sounds, words
Site-specific audio-visual performance (duration 50 minutes). 

Screening on a large screen of the introductory video to the exhibition Uzbekistan: The Avant-Garde in the Desert—Paolo Nori The Language of the Avant-Gardes.

Improvisations: Musical translations from the Oriental Avant-Garde by Ensemble Musicafoscari (Arianna Moro soprano, Silvia Cattarinich soprano, Ottavia Carlon violin, Chiara Trabujo cello, Federica Lizio alto saxophone, Daniele Goldoni trumpet, Francesco Rossi electric guitar, Silvia Tesser keyboard, Eugenio Cereser keyboard) with the projection of some works in the exhibition.

6pm–12:30am, open exhibition
Uzbekistan: The Avant-Garde in the Desert
Venue: University Ca’ Foscari Venice—Exhibition Spaces, Dorsoduro 3246
Curated by Silvia Burini and Giuseppe Barbieri

The exhibition, conceived as a unitary project, is divided into two coherent and interlinked sections (Florence-Palazzo Pitti: Light and Colour; Venice-Ca’Foscari Exhibitions: Form and Symbol) and presents for the first time to the Italian public and to the Western Europe the fascinating development of painting in Uzbekistan from the end of the 19th century when an easel painting experience finally began until 1937, the year when the rigid and binding dictates of Socialist Realism also arrived in the Soviet republics of Central Asia.

Guided tours without booking (until places are filled) at 6:30pm; 7:30pm (special tour with the exhibition curators); 8:30pm; 9pm; 11pm