Etnia House of Arts transforms Venice’s Chiesa della Misericordia An artistic dialogue becoming collective
On May 5, Etnia House of Arts will come to life, the new platform dedicated to contemporary creativity promoted by Etnia Eyewear Culture, within the spaces of the Chiesa della Misericordia in Venice. A project that not only engages with the environment that hosts it, but also embraces its history and nature, suspended between permanence and transformation. It is precisely this nature that makes it today the ideal ground for a new contemporary vision. It is in this context that Etnia House of Arts takes shape: an active platform devoted to the creativity of our time, interdisciplinary dialogue, and the construction of a temporary community of practices and visions.
«Over the years we have worked closely with artists, until we felt the need to create a space where this dialogue could become continuous rather than episodic. La Misericordia seemed like the right place to do it: an almost kaleidoscopic treasure chest where something already present could be activated. Etnia House of Arts was born from this idea: to build a context in which vision is not only represented but staged, activating unexpected relationships» said David Pellicer, CEO and Owner of Etnia Barcelona.
Promoted by Etnia Eyewear Culture, the broader expression of the cultural research carried out by Etnia Barcelona, the project does not simply reactivate a historic space, but redefines its function: the Chiesa della Misericordia becomes Etnia House of Arts, a living environment where art is not only exhibited, but produced, narrated, and made visible in the act of becoming. The architectural intervention designed by Piero Vespignani and Alessia Semenzato of Studio Anfibio also enhances the historical layers of the Chiesa della Misericordia, bringing back to light elements such as the 14th century wooden roof and a rare Gothic window, restoring to the space a new public function, not celebratory but generative.
The programme unfolds as a continuous and open device, structured through exhibitions, site specific interventions, performances and talks, some independently produced, others developed in collaboration with leading figures in cultural and artistic production. A central element of the project is the programme of international residencies, where artists are invited to work starting from a deliberately anomalous element, the eyewear piece, transforming it into a surface of experimentation and representation: the first artists involved are Conxi Sane, whose work explores abstraction and surrealism, and Greta Pllana, whose painterly practice questions identity and memory.
The creative process that drives the residencies develops in direct relationship with the space of La Misericordia, with the city of Venice, and with the presence of visitors, who come into contact not only with the completed work, but with its stages of construction, creating a bond with the artist. In this sense, every visit becomes a situated and unrepeatable experience. On the occasion of the opening, the collaboration with Skira will activate a calendar of talks with artists and leading voices from the cultural scene.
Etnia House of Arts is a project that fits within a line of research moving beyond the traditional exhibition model toward hybrid forms: residency, laboratory, cultural platform. A place where production and fruition coincide, and where the public is not a passive spectator, but part of a system of relationships. In a city where art is often preserved as memory, the Misericordia returns to being a place of the present.
