Articolo disponibile anche in: Italian

Art can mirror a period in time and be a messenger of peace. From the emptiness of war, when, in the early 90s in a besieged Sarajevo you didn’t know if you would see the light of day, the idea end symbol of the new Europe was born; a piece of the world which opens its frontiers and goes beyond racial, religious, and ethnic differences.

It is the hope of the cultural world and the collective and international breath that finds space and expression in an artistic project which is now 20 years old.

Its supporters are the great artists of international fame which created it and who now dream of being nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize of 2018.

Ars Aevi, acronym of Sarajevo, was born from an idea of Enver Hadziomerspahic, resident of Greve in Chianti, peace project actualized as a contemporary art museum, the most important of south-eastern Europe, set up in the Sarajevo Olympics Center in 2000 square meters of space.

It is a large and heterogeneous art collection, thanks to the donations of some of the greatest artists on the international scene: Michelangelo Pistoletto, Jannis Kounellis, Daniel Buren, Joseph Kosuth, Ilya Kabakov, Marina Abramovic, Anish Kapoor, Bill Viola, Mona Hatoum, Lena Liv, Braco Dimitrijevic, Bizhan Bassiri and others.

Each has left a piece of himself by donating a work of art to the collection. It was a long road made though ideas, strong convictions and generous forms of support, among which the project elaborated by Renzo Piano regarding the structure that will host the museum during the 2017-2018 Biennal in Sarajevo.

The Town of Greve in Chianti, where the project initiated, showed it support, the first in Italy, during the open Town council on Thursday, November 17. The following took part in the event: Enver Hadziomerspahic and other supporters; Claudio Martini, Antonio Lucchesi, Rossella Rossi, Marino Montanarini and Paolo Saturnini.

“We will continue the tradition”, said Mayor Paolo Sottani, “proud to have been present at the birth of the project and aware of the role that Tuscany and Italy had in forming the collection. We give Ars Aevi all of our support in the hopes of the Nobel Prize for 2018, the 100th anniversary of peace after the first world war. We hope it will serve the function of cultural mediation which in itself is an instrument of peace, dialogue and sharing. The identity of a nation is born from uniting people, not from separating them”.

Ars Aevi was founded by an international network of museums and European centers and foundations and their artistic directors: in Milan, the Center for Contemporary Art, human “Spazio” directed by Enrico Comi; in Prato, the Luigi Pecci Museum conducted by Bruno Corà; in Lubiana, the Modern Gallery directed by Zdenka Badovinac; the Querini Stampalia Foundation of Venice with its director, Chiara Bertola; in Vienna, the Museum Moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig directed by Lorand Hegyi; in Bolognano “Il Clavicembalo” led by Lucrezia De Domizio Durini; the Bm Contemporary Art Center of Istanbul, directed by Beral Madra; in Podgoritza, the center of contemporary Art of Montenegro with Petar Cukovic.

The initiative has received important acknowledgments over the years by bodies like Unesco (1999) and the the European Commission (2000).