Artissima - "the most important contemporary art fair in Italy" - celebrated its 30th edition in early November crowned with the  sentimental title, "Nature as Kinship / Knowledge as Care" which made it misleadingly sound like it was organised with a view to taking environmental action and raising environmental awareness through a unified effort by 181 participating galleries from 33 countries across 4 continents. As a journalist, I am a newcomer to the Italian art scene though I felt very much at home because of my experience in home country Turkey (Türkiye) where - most often - serious subjects simply remain as striking titles. As an art fair, Artissima 2023 was about the galleries, the publishers and the products it showcased. How foolish to expect intellectual input from commercial activity! Artissima 2023 was not about nature or kinship. Neither was it about knowledge or care. If you wish to read a review of the artistic value of the fair, there are now plenty of those online. However, this is not a review of Artissima. It is imagined as an informal critique, intended to be accessible to everyone present and future, and its sole purpose is to demonstrate care. 

To quote from Luigi Fassi - Director of Artissima who has been in office for two years now: "The theme of the 30th Artissima is Relations of care and is an idea from a piece written by Renzo Taddei in 2022. Taddei teaches at the Federal University of San Paolo in Brazil and is one of the most authoritative contemporary anthropologists in the Latin American area. (...) Relations of care is a concept taken from a book published by Ruby Press of Berlin titled Everyday Matters, a miscellaneous product on some urgent issues arising mainly from the world of architecture, design, town planning and anthropology. Taddei's essay in this book is based on the premise that we find ourselves in a context of crises at various levels that strike the imagination of Western man. " This is Fassi's response to Franco Fanelli as part of an interview published in the Artissima newsletter handed out free-of-charge to fair visitors. I am actually curious to find out how many visitors have read this interview or for that matter, Renzo Taddei's essay titled, "Intervention of Another Nature: Resources for Thinking in (and out of) the Anthropocene". 

I visited Artissima 2023 during the press preview on 2nd November which also happened to be the VIP day. It is always an interesting decision to bring together journalists and VIPs. At one gallery I visited, I was mistaken for a collector! However, this also meant that I had the opportunity to observe social media influencers, high-society types, influential art collectors, academics, gallerists and art business entrepreneurs. I gathered quite early on that a great majority of these individuals were not at all interested in the title of the fair or in Renzo Taddei's essay. I am sure most of them were not aware of the link that was drawn between the inspiration for Artissima's 30th edition and the Anthropocene (a concept suggested by Eugene Stoermer and Paul Crutzen back in 2000 to describe the current geological epoch of the planet). 

I would like to quote directly from Renzo Taddei's inspiring anthropological output: "The Anthropocene is the moment when the global elites (cultural and scientific ones included) realise that their paradigms and ideologies were efficacious in helping them accomplish their short-term desires but at the face of destroying everyone's capacity for long-term survival" (p. 129). Although, perhaps an insertion would be favourable here: "at the face of destroying everyone's capacity (adults and children present and future) for long-term survival." In the faces of the elite whom I saw, I observed not an ounce of this realisation. 

So what bone do I have to pick with the title "Nature as Kinship, Knowledge as Care" and Artissima's 2023 edition? It's just a title, and that is the problem. 

Held at the Oval Lingotto Arena, an indoor arena originally built for the Winter 2006 Olympics with a capacity of 8500 spectators and currently used for expositions and fairs including the Turin International Book Fair in spring every year, I am considering how much fossil fuel goes into heating this space for four days of Artissima and any other fair held there. It was really quite hot considering its vastness. I made an effort to find out information about the energy rating of the building and it came up blank. I think that when such a prestigious contemporary art fair decides to hold its 30th edition - especially when it's titled after such a concept - it becomes accountable for its choice of venue.  I doubt anyone (neither from Artissima nor from Oval Lingotto) will respond to this request for transparency. 

An estimated 34,000 visitors attended Artissima this year, many of whom were travelling from other cities or countries. They paid their entrance fees and enjoyed a weekend of contemporary art, food and wine in the elegant and extremely industrious city of Turin that has been battling with air pollution for a long time and in 2023 was ranked as the most polluted city in Italy. When I arrived at Artissima which was yet to open its doors to the general public, the car park was already full. I am not in any way advocating that people should not travel, after all, I took a bus and two trains to get there. All throughout my adult life people have told me, "get yourself a driving licence, get a car, why are you tiring yourself out like this?" Well, first of all, I have always lived in cities with good public transport links and been able to enjoy the perk of using public transport. Unlike many of the people I have encountered in Italy over the past fourteen months, I do not consider this a sign of poverty or desperation. I consider it as part of `doing my bit` for the environment. 

As far as I am aware there is no road tax in place for driving into the heart of the city or to Oval Lingotto. In a city where the concentration of PM 2.5 is currently 2.2 times higher than the annual World Health Organisation air quality guideline value, there ought to be stricter measures and more red-tape for all industry as well as fossil fuel consuming vehicles.  Especially now more than before, when most art fairs are no longer contained within a single venue but spill across entire cities with side projects that contribute to increased human traffic. In the case of Artissima, the count added up to eight projects across Turin. I won't even get into the amount of unrecyclable materials and plastics that have been consumed in those four days. It absolutely sickens me. There is definitely room for improvement for raising environmental awareness and taking action here in Italy. People tend to think that if they appropriately recycle plastics (by simply putting their plastic waste in the correct bin) it won't harm the environment. Well, it does. It is extremely hard to recycle plastics and even the process of doing so causes pollution. And what about the amount of water required for recycling plastics! The only way to stop the pollution and environmental degradation is to not use plastics! Art and art-related activities should make its goal to be sensitive to all types of pollution rather than positioning itself as a generator of conspicuous consumption. 

In any case, with ease, I can state that most of the works on display had nothing to do with nature as kinship and knowledge as care. Social media and social trends have completely invaded the contemporary art practice. I walk around the fair quite a few times and I am stifled with a thousand works that mean absolutely nothing to anyone. My grandmother's trinkets have more material and sentimental value.

However, there were a handful established and emerging artists whose works were relevant to the title and our planetary plight. Namely, Oliver Ressler (The Gallery Apart), Radenko Milak (Ani Molnar Gallery), Charles Le Hyaric (Galerie Papillon), Michelangelo Consani (MeVanucci), Hendrickje Schimmel aka "Tenant of Culture" (Galerie Fons Welters), Judith Raum (Galeri Zilberman) were the artists behind some of the works that caught my attention both in terms of their artistic skill, chosen mediums and the way they relate to some of the subjects that are currently occupying my mind.