A guide to the events scheduled for September 2022 in Venice, including the Biennale Cinema and Musica, Glass Week, and Venice Cocktail Week
September in Venice begins with the highly anticipated Venice Film Festival, which celebrates its 90th anniversary this year with the 79th edition. It is also a month of significant cultural events such as the Regata Storica, the Biennale Musica, Glass Week—falling within the United Nations International Year of Glass (IYOG 2022)—and Venice Cocktail Week.
Spectacle on the lagoon
Until September 10, 2022, Cinema Galleggiante – Acque Sconosciute (Floating Cinema – Unknown Waters) returns to the waters of the Venice lagoon, featuring international cinema, musical, and theatrical performances.
The program includes auteur films, 50 authors from around the world, more than 30 cultural organizations, and Venetian rowing clubs that will ferry spectators without boats to the shallow area adjacent to the Retro Giudecca canal, near the Rio de Sant’Eufemia.
Among the new features: on September 16, 17, and 18, from the afternoon until dusk, various musicians will interact with an interactive sound installation by Turin artist Alessandro Sciaraffa.
The surreal, oneiric visions, and dreams are the themes of Cinema Galleggiante 2022, the same themes found in the Venice Art Biennale (open to the public until November 21) and in the exhibition Surrealism and Magic: Enchanted Modernity, still ongoing until September 26 at the Peggy Guggenheim Collection, which is a new partner of the event this year along with Chantal Crousel Consulting, the National Pavilion of Uzbekistan, and Combo.
A project by Edoardo Aruta and Paolo Rosso presented by Microclima, in collaboration with TBA21–Academy – Ocean Space, Pentagram Stiftung, Palazzo Grassi – Punta della Dogana – Pinault Collection, Fondazione In Between Art Film, and many others.
Full details on the event and the program are available on the website www.cinemagalleggiante.it, where mandatory reservations can be made for both private boats and the public on foot, with the purchase of a donation ticket of 5 or 10 euros.
Selected Works 1985-2021
From September 2 to October 2, 2022, the new exhibition space in Ruga Giuffa – Castello, Venicephotography, presents a selection of nearly 30 works by the Venetian Michele Alassio: a photographic narrative of 35 years of activity as a professional photographer.
Bad Lands
In collaboration with the Holden Luntz Gallery of Palm Beach, from September 3 to October 28, laToletta SpazioEventi hosts the first Italian exhibition of Bad Lands by American photographer Michael Eastman.
The Regata Storica
On Sunday, September 4, everyone gathers along Venice’s Grand Canal to witness (or participate in) one of the most spectacular and engaging moments of the year in Venetian life and Voga alla Veneta: the Regata Storica, a rowing event faithful to tradition that represents the glory of one of the most powerful and influential Maritime Republics in Mediterranean history.
The event is divided into two parts: the Historical Procession and the competitive regattas featuring participants as young as 12 or 14, women on two-oared mascarete, and champions on two-oared gondolini, which last year saw father Rudi Vignotto and son Mattia from the island of Sant’Erasmo win in the orange gondolino.
Read the program and schedule on the website www.regatastoricavenezia.it.
Vibrant Transparencies
Curated by Sabrina Rastelli, from September 7 to October 23, Vibrant Transparencies: Yaozhou Ceramics from the Shang Shan Tang Collection is the exhibition at the MAOV Museum of Oriental Art of Venice – Ca’ Pesaro, featuring ceramics from the Yaozhou kilns.
On display are 96 works from the ancient kilns of northern China, which for centuries were famous for producing artifacts with vibrant decorative motifs carved or impressed under a transparent olive-green celadon glaze and blue-green qingci ceramics, reminiscent of jade, the symbolic material of China.
International Festival of Contemporary Music
The musical theater Out of Stage by Lucia Ronchetti is approaching: the 66th International Festival of Contemporary Music will take place from September 14 to 25, 2022, in the Arsenale area used by the Venice Biennale, in Venice’s main theaters, and including the Sansovino Hall of the Marciana Library, St. Mark’s Basilica, the Chapter House of the Scuola Grande di San Rocco, the Sala delle Colonne of Ca’ Giustinian, the spaces of the “Benedetto Marcello” Conservatory at Palazzo Pisani, and the Squero of the Giorgio Cini Foundation.
The Program features numerous events focused on new forms of contemporary musical theater and the role of new technologies, multimedia, and virtual and augmented reality applied to sound.
The Biennale Musica 2022 is an experimental stage featuring works by artists from all over the world, from Dutch composer and director Michel van der Aa, who presents The Book of Water—based on the theme of land erosion caused by rain and flooding, inspired by Max Frisch’s novel Man in the Holocene—to Sicilian Paolo Buonvino, who presents a scenic concert based on the experience of a collective breath as sound and vital gesture.
Italian premieres include the Sleep Laboratory project by Alexander Schubert: a one-hour immersive and participatory performance where the audience is invited to lie on camp beds and, while wearing VR goggles, is transported into different sound realities between dreams and visions.
On the festival’s opening night at Teatro La Fenice, a new production of Jules Verne by Giorgio Battistelli, Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement 2022, will be staged, curated by Angelo Linzalata and performed by Antonio Caggiano, Rodolfo Rossi, and Gianluca Ruggeri, founders and members of Ars Ludi, Silver Lion 2022.
The festival also features classics of “instrumental theater” by Mauricio Kagel and Georges Aperghis and works by composers Carola Bauckholt and François Sarhan, as well as a collaboration with Rai Radio 3 for Lezioni di Musica: four episodes curated by Paola Damiani, live from Ca’ Giustinian, and a collaboration with BBC Radio 3, which will participate with a special edition of the New Music Show curated by radio presenter Tom Service, who will be in Venice to moderate the two concerts on September 17 and 18.
The Venice/Italian Glass Week
From September 17 to 25, 2022, The Venice Glass Week returns to Venice, and this year for its 6th edition, in collaboration with Vision Milan Glass Week, it presents a new event: The Italian Glass Weeks.
“2022 will underline—as stated in the United Nations resolution—the technological, scientific, economic, environmental, historical, and artistic role of glass in our society, highlighting the rich possibilities for the development of technologies and their potential contribution to addressing the challenges of sustainable development and inclusive societies.”
During the United Nations International Year of Glass (IYOG 2022), the new festival dedicated to the art of Italian glass, which showcases, promotes, and supports glass in Italy at national and international levels, will take place in two main stages: the first in Milan from September 10 to 18, 2022, dedicated to industrial glass, and the second in Venice from September 17 to 25, focused on artistic glass.
Events, exhibitions, workshops, art installations, performances, educational activities, guided tours, and many cultural meetings in a Venice that confirms itself as a forge of creativity for glass and its artisanal and artistic craftsmanship.
Jewelry on display
Until September 25, The Transparent Breath is ongoing at Palazzo Nani Mocenigo – ADmore Gallery (Fondamenta Nani 960) in Venice. This international exhibition celebrates artistic glass jewelry, promoted by the Venice Art Design Cultural Association and curated by Lisa Balasso and Eleonora Varotto.
For The Italian Glass Week 2022, on September 18 at 11:00 AM, there will be a free meeting with the international designers and artists participating in the festival created for the International Year of Glass.
The Transparent Breath celebrates the genius of the artist, the breath that shapes the material and makes it as unique as it is eternal.
On display are creations made using various glass-working techniques. We find the blue bubbles of DriftLand (Russia), the molecular forms of pieces by SiO2 Glass Jewelry (Spain), the necklaces of Antonija Gospić (Croatia), the transparent bubbles of Kopoli (Japan), the sculptural rings of Agustina Ros (Spain), the evocative creations of Olga Tabakova (Russia), the marine creatures of Cecilia López Bravo (USA), the experimental works of Alberto Corte (Italy), and the precious reflections in the blown beads of Muriel Balensi (Italy).
Ancient lampworking is seen in the oneiric-visionary rings of Atelier Alessandra, in the beads inspired by nature and the marine world by Móró Barbara Glass (Hungary), the talismans of Anna Boothe (USA), the delicate-toned beads of Amy West, and the shining chains of Minori Takagi (Canada) and Glass Berries (Latvia).
Examples of the fusing technique are found in Celina Glass Art (Germany), in the fused pendants of David Melamed (Canada), and in the work of Alexandra Mezo (Ireland).
Furthermore, jewelry by Ioanna Art Jewelry (Serbia), wearable works by L’Étoile de Verre, and the statuesque luminous sculptures of Ana Marìa Reque Sotelo.
Special issue of FMR on the Wonders of Glass
On the island of San Giorgio, home of the Giorgio Cini Foundation, on Wednesday, September 21 at 5:30 PM, the Institute of Art History, through the Glass Study Center and in collaboration with the magazine FMR, presents Wonders of Glass in FMR: “the most beautiful magazine in the world”.
An event by reservation (subject to availability) dedicated to the third issue of the magazine on the art of glass, with an opening text by art historian and collector David Landau, an unpublished article by W. Warmus and E. Reynaud, and images by Guido Mocafico of Leopold and Rudolf Blaschka, Bohemian master glassmakers of the second half of the 19th century.
Visions of the future in the Teatro Verde
Artificial intelligence, 3D creation and modeling, sound design, and fashion combined with the architecture of the Teatro Verde of the Giorgio Cini Foundation on the island of San Giorgio, give life to the original work La Maschera del Tempo (The Mask of Time) by Mattia Casalegno and Martux_m.
World premiere on September 29 at 6:00 PM in the Foundation’s Tapestry Hall (by reservation only on the website) of a project that combines in-depth archival research conducted at the Institute for Theater and Melodrama of the Giorgio Cini Foundation with innovative technological application.
Venice Cocktail Week returns
Following the success of the first edition last December, Venice Cocktail Week returns to Venice from September 26 to October 2, 2022, in collaboration with Vela and under the patronage of the City of Venice.
An intense week of meetings and events in Venice’s best cocktail bars and historic cafés, featuring a cocktail list of 4 unique #VCW22 drinks designed by Venetian bartenders to introduce La Serenissima and its traditions:
– Signature Cocktail, a freely created drink
– RiEsco a Bere Italiano Cocktail, a drink dedicated to Made in Italy with products from exclusively Italian companies participating in the RiEsco a Bere Italiano initiative
– The Midday Aperitif, a fresh and light drink ideal for the midday aperitif, a great Venetian tradition, and for all hours of the day
– Leon d’Oro, a drink inspired by cinema
Article by Lucia Pecoraro.
Photo credits: Cortestudioglass, ring (Fatemi uscire); Cinema Galleggiante 2020 ©Chiara Becattini – 2021 ©Riccardo-Banfi; Photo by Michael Eastman; Detail of a cup with turtle and lotus motif – Stoneware with blue-green glaze, Yaozhou Kilns, Five Dynasties period (907-960) or Northern Song (960-1127), Shang Shan Tang Collection; Pair of lobed cups, stoneware with blue-green glaze, Yaozhou Kilns – Early Northern Song Dynasty (960-1127), Shang Shan Tang Collection; Alexander Schubert ©privat; 1a portrait of Giorgio Battistelli ©Fabrizio Sansoni; Lee ©AndreaAvezzù; Annelies Van Parys ©Trui Hanoulle; The Venice Glass Week 2021 ©Massimo Pistore; ©MELBAS 801 Model Licia Fertz for Celina Glass Art – Celina; Anna Boothe Pate de Verity Hand in Hand; Ana Maria Reque Sotelo MEDUSA ©Gino Gabrieli; Agustina Ros Blown Ring; VCW day 5-20 ©Michele Tamasco; Paola Mencarelli at the Hotel Aman ©Veronica Gaido.
