Migration Addicts

　　Curated by Biljana Ciric, Karin Gavassa

　　Various venues in public space, Venice
6th through 15th june 2007

　　Artists Participating: Htein Lin (Myanmar), Jin Shan (China), Li Pinghu (China), Huang Kui (China), Miljohn Ruperto (Philippines/USA), Josefina Posch (Sweden, USA), Mogas Station (Vietnam), TODO (Italy), Belén Cerezo (Spain), Yap Sau Bin (Malaysia), Hasan Elahi (Bangladesh, USA), Rizman Putra (Singapore)

　　Migration Addicts has been selected from hundreds of submissions from around the world for the Collateral Events, a section of the Biennale which shows public museum quality projects chosen by Robert Storr, the artistic director of the 52nd Venice Biennale.

　　Migration Addicts began as an ongoing project two years ago in Shanghai, investigating how migration determines issues related to human identity, gender and spiritual needs. The fast expansion of urban spaces, following the model of big cities, has led to new social conflicts within society.

　　Recently the tension between Western and Chinese traditional values and lifestyles, as well as the late arrival of capitalism and the persistence of communism has not hindered the Chinese impulse towards assimilating the "international standards," while fostering its own economic development.

　　The project is touching upon topics which concern not only Shanghai but many other expanding Asian and Western cities. The structure of the exhibition is based on a series of interventions that will take place throughout the public space in Venice, articulating new perspectives entrenched directly in the urban environment, and methodologically operating in time and in space.

　　The exhibition investigates the questions of temporal and spatial strategies which deal with this situation. On political and aesthetic levels, these projects represent a bridge between art and life, interacting with people from outside artistic circles, expanding the idea of art and its experience, to continue an engagement with the public sphere.

　　Venice is currently undergoing profound changes with respect to the urban landscape and its own future depends on the new structure it undertakes. More and more Venetians are leaving the lagoon to settle in other towns. In the next 30-40 years, it is certain that Venice's population will be dramatically reduced.

　　The artists participating in Migration Addicts face through their own culture and artistic practices the topic of migration, providing a direct relationship with the public space where the exhibition is hosted, reflecting on the peculiarity of the territory, investigating differences and possible points in common.