The Bridges of Graffiti

The name ARTERMINAL originates from not only the Venue current use and functionality – a passenger terminal – but also from the concept of harbor as a space of trade, exchange and passage for distant cultures.
A metaphor that seems pertinent in this context of a form of Art traditionally outside the box brought to relate itself with the illustrious establishment of the Venice Biennale.

The San Basilio passengers terminal, currently used by Autorità Portuale Venezia (APV) only in part, has been identified as the proper location for Arterminal and The Bridges of Graffiti exhibition.
“The Bridges of Graffiti” project positions itself 30 years after “Arte di Frontiera. New York Graffiti”, the exhibition curated by Francesca Alinovi that in 1984 brought the New York graffiti writers artistic scene in Italy.

Traditional spray-painted graffiti artworks were born at the geographic edges of Manhattan, a frontier in itself and also “an intermediate space between culture and nature, mass and elite, black and white, aggressiveness and irony, trash and exquisite refinement”. “The Bridges of Graffiti” will settle in a proper frontier, the San Basilio Terminal, opening doors and building bridges so that past generations’ major contributions to the graffiti culture can finally be acknowledged and put into context. It’s an ideal bridge but also a tangible one, chronicling the influence and cross-pollination of Artists and Artworks that crossed the Ocean; the exhibition is about graffiti Artists who either already had or later on developed a figurative style as well, and have been evolving and reinventing themselves, staying ahead or outside the curve.

These dialogues will be expressed though a dual-installation approach with San Basilio as a white canvas for figurative expressions and a documentation of this multifaceted art form at its beginning
by Henry Chalfant and Martha Cooper, opposite to those Artists whose works have landed in museums worldwide and avidly embraced by corporate sponsors skyrocketing their values into the mainstream culture and Art world.