While the memory of Manifesta 12 Palermo is still vivid in our mind, during this summer Manifesta13 Marseille Artistic Team – Katerina Chuchalina, Stefan Kalmár, Marina Otero Verzier, and Alya Sebti - together with the Manifesta director Hedwig Fijen, has revealed the title and the first ideas for this new edition, that will be held from 7 June 2020 until 1 November 2020, in Marseille and its region.
Titled "Traits d’union.s" this new edition will inherit the Palermitan method which provides that the event curatorship entrusted to a group of creative mediators from different backgrounds and areas of expertise... all engaged on different activity aimed by the wish to integrate the biennial into the social, cultural and political framework of Marseille.
As declared by the Manifesta Director, Hedwig Fijen: “In continuation of the thematic approach and model of Manifesta 12 in Palermo, we have looked for another southern Mediterranean, historically important central city allowing us to engage with the 21st century urgent global and local issues. This second city of France seems to always be positioned as the ‘outsider’ city characterized by many contradictions since many citizens consider themselves first Marseillaise and second French. Yet Marseille, with its great port city multiculturalism, and all its complexities and struggles, is for us maybe the ultimate test of how Marseille, France and Europe are facing the most important conflicts of our time. The appointed artistic team has our confidence to create a critical response to the current state of affairs in Europe and an artistic vision how we can look at global issues through the spectrum of Marseille.”
On the occasion of the announcement of the title of the upcoming Manifesta 13 Marseille biennial (29 June 2019), the education and mediation team has released the key mediation concepts and initial projects under the umbrella of "Le Tiers Programme". At the core of the programme is the notion of voicing the unheard, including multi-histories into the city’s common heritage. These multi-histories give an insight into what Marseille is today and what it can become in the future. Indeed, by looking out from the institution, Manifesta 13’s Le Tiers Programme derives from encounters and conversations between educators, mediators, artists, researchers, teachers, students, and other engaged citizens in Marseille.
Another important concept... Le Tiers Programme will be balanced on two pillars: the biennial agenda and that of the Marseillais. Part of the programme derives from the artistic and curatorial dialogue and includes a series of projects ac-companying artistic interventions of Manifesta 13 in different neighbourhoods, as well as an extensive mediation programme during the biennial. Another part of the programme traces genealogies of Marseille as a host city. Complementing the main curatorial pro-gramme Traits d’Union.s unfolded in reimagined institutions, Le Tiers Programme seeks to investigate non-institutional spaces or their remains.
Finally, the programme title derives from Gilles Clément’s notion of "Third Landscape": an « undetermined fragment of the planetary garden » consisting of the sum of places given back to nature by man’s neglect. It is a refuge for diversity left to all biological beings, a territory in the absence of any human decision, a celebration of neighbouring « unattended » spaces. If you want to find more information about the official program and the collateral events, under the name Les Parallèles du Sud (the deadline for submission is 25 September 2019), click here Manifesta 13 Marseille.
Cover image: Manifesta Title Announcement ©H.Bossy
Stay Tuned to Kooness magazine for more exciting news from the art world.