e-flux Bienal de Valencia 2003 Txomin Badiola “SOS Episode 4 (Wholesome thinking but retail living)” (2000-01), construction in wood and metal, 394 x 390 x 300 cms. Ciudad Ideal/The Ideal City Valencia (Spain), various exhibition venues in the city centre >From June to September 2003 Bienal de Valencia Carrer Sant Pius V, 9 46010 Valencia (Spain) Tel.: (34) 963 605 793 Fax: (34) 963 931 971 e: info@bienaldevalencia.com e: press@bienaldevalencia.com Bienal de Valencia 2003 Communication between the arts La Ciudad Ideal The Ideal City Valencia (Spain), various exhibition venues in the city centre >From June to September 2003 Presentation at: Exit Art (NYC) 21.02.2003 6:30 p.m. ICA (London) 25.02.2003 6:30 p.m. GianFranco Ferré 26.02.2003 8:00 p.m. During the presentation a video by the Spanish film director Bigas Luna will be shown, and the participating curators: Will Alsop, Mike Figgis, Lóránd Hegyi, Francisco Jarauta, and Bruce McLean will be in attendance. The Ideal City Where is society heading at the beginning of this third millennium? What’s the brave new world really going to be like? Whether expectant or terrified, these are the questions we are asking ourselves. What does city mean anymore? What does home mean? What are the things that make up a city? What are the thoughts, doubts, fears, certainties, reflections that come to meet us face-to-face as we head towards these material and immaterial territories where we live? “While the first Valencia Biennial questioned art as a virtue/vice of communication and communication as a virtue/vice of art”, in the words of the director Luigi Settembrini “the second Biennial will explore, together with leading international artists and creators, the central problem facing the world today: the destiny of diversity. And it will do so through a group of works and projects conceived especially for Valencia which will help us to question the power and potential of the city, of The Ideal City, understood as a prismatic place capable of symbolically ordering and accommodating difference and differences without smothering them.” A unique event in the world, covering the spectrum of creative languages making up our culture, the Valencia Biennial establishes itself as an international meeting place where the visual arts, architecture, cinema, design, theatre, music, dance, fashion and advertising all dialogue together. Reflecting on, investigating and experimenting with these languages, conscious of the fact that any cultural experience is ultimately a profoundly communicative act, is then the main aim of the Valencia Biennial and one it hopes to share with the general public. The Ideal City Director: Luigi Settembrini 1. THE EXHIBITIONS A & M (Department Stores of Proper Behaviour) Curators: Will Alsop and Bruce McLean The Museum of the Imperfect Past Curator: Mike Figgis Solares (or On Optimism) Curator: Lóránd Hegyi The Face, Mirror of Society Artist: Sebastiâo Salgado Micro-UTOPÍAS Curators: Francisco Jarauta and Jean Louis Maubant 2. A SOCIAL PROJECT Sociópolis Curator: Vicente Guallart 3. PROYECTS OF COMMUNICATIONS Ephemeral Architectures Curator: Rafael Sierra Can the Children Save Us? Artists: 500 children from Valencia 4. THEATRE IN COLLABORATION WITH THE IDEAL CITY AND THE CITY OF PERFORMING ARTS (Artistic director: Irene Papas) I Take Your Hand in Mine by Carol Rocamora Director: Peter Brook Lisistra by Aristophane Director: Carlos Santos Shakespeare and his Masks National Ballet of Cuba Director/Choreographer: Alicia Alonso Odyssey 2003 Mediterranean Arts Ship Barbarian comedies by Valle-Inclán Director: Bigas Luna (Closing event of the 2nd Bienal de Valencia) In this ever smaller world, can art and the arts help us to understand that there still exist an infinity of identities, cultures, religions, beliefs and certainties? Can we manage to find among all these elements of value and confidence something more than denunciation and despair? At least that is what we hope for and what we promise. Bienal de Valencia Carrer Sant Pius V, 9 46010 Valencia (Spain) Tel.: (34) 963 605 793 Fax: (34) 963 931 971 e-mail: info@bienaldevalencia.com press@bienaldevalencia.com