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Name: Lorenzo Giusti, Director, Galleria d’Arte Moderna e Contemporanea di Bergamo (GAMeC)

“The pandemic has brought to light something that was perhaps already implicit: that the museum cannot be reduced to its infrastructure.“

Radio GAMeC emerged as a response to the pandemic-induced isolation in Bergamo. To what extent do you see this project as a critique of the static nature of a museum building?

Radio GAMeC was not conceived as a critique of the museum building per se, but over time it has effectively emerged as a way to test—and, ultimately, expand—its epistemological and spatial limits. The pandemic has brought to light something that was perhaps already implicit: that the museum cannot be reduced to its infrastructure. When access to the building was suspended, what remained was the living constellation of relationships, voices, and temporalities that the museum shares. Bringing this constellation to the fore was our way of being present and staying close to a suffering community. And radio became the medium through which this continuity could be sustained.

In this sense, the project did not oppose the museum as architecture, but helped us reposition it within a broader conception of institutional space: a temporal space, in which meaning is produced through dialogue. Radio is therefore not an alternative to the museum, but a way to make its relational condition operational.

“Within Pedagogy of Hope, hope is not understood as an abstract or utopian category, but as a methodological principle: something that is enacted through dialogue, through the recognition of plurality, and through the continuous negotiation of meaning.“

You refer to Paulo Freire’s “Pedagogy of Hope. Why did you choose this approach?

The reference to Paulo Freire is grounded in the need to rethink education as a critical and emancipatory practice within cultural institutions today. Freire’s work allows us to move beyond the idea of education as transmission toward an understanding of knowledge as a shared and situated process. In a context increasingly shaped by algorithmic mediation and standardized forms of learning, this shift becomes particularly urgent. As Freire writes, ‘there is no teaching without learning’. This statement destabilizes any vertical model of authority and instead foregrounds reciprocity as the condition for knowledge production. Within Pedagogy of Hope, hope is not understood as an abstract or utopian category, but as a methodological principle: something that is enacted through dialogue, through the recognition of plurality, and through the continuous negotiation of meaning.

“It allows fora proximity that is not visual but acoustic—an immaterial yet deeply embodied form of encounter.“

Why should the medium of radio be better able to convey identities and affiliations more directly than a visual representation in an exhibition space?

Radio does not replace the visual regime of the exhibition, but it operates through a different economy of attention. By privileging voice, duration, and listening, it constructs a form of relation that is less mediated by representation and more anchored in presence. It allows fora proximity that is not visual but acoustic—an immaterial yet deeply embodied form of encounter.

What prompted you to prefer developing participatory projects for society today rather than curating traditional museum exhibitions?

I would not frame this as a preference, but rather as an expansion of curatorial responsibility. Contemporary institutions are increasingly called upon to operate across multiple registers simultaneously: exhibition-making remains central, but it is no longer sufficient on its own torespond to the complexity of the present. Participatory formats allow the institution to engage with processes rather than objects alone, activating forms of knowledge that are relational, situated, and often unpredictable. In this sense, the shift is not away from exhibitions, but toward a broader ecology of practices in which the museum becomes a platform for continuous production of meaning.

“The Venice Biennale is a platform of amplification and friction, where different institutional, artistic, and curatorial voices enter into proximity.“

What does it mean to you personally to be present in the highly competitive environment of the Biennale?

The Venice Biennale is a platform of amplification and friction, where different institutional,

artistic, and curatorial voices enter into proximity. For us, participating means contributing a format that is not object-based but process-based, capable of inserting itself into the Biennale as a discursive and temporal device rather than a traditional exhibition presence. The challenge is therefore not visibility, but coherence: maintaining a clear conceptual identity while remaining open to the heterogeneity of the context.

“Italy is today a land in between; it is not a post-colonial country in the same way that England and France are.“

Italy has an immense cultural heritage. How do you perceive the current situation for artists and curators in Italy?

For several years now, the art scene in Italy has been in the shadows. Artists working in Italy struggle to gain recognition abroad. I believe there are several reasons for this. Reasons that, in my view, are cultural rather than structural. Italy is today a land in between; it is not a post-colonial country in the same way that England and France are. 

Or, in a different way, Spain and Portugal. And today, post-colonial narratives are understandably what most interest the global art system. Nor is Italy a dominant economy, a powerful market capable of asserting itself forcefully, as other parts of the globe are doing right now. At the same time, this situation creates a field of tension that can prove highly productive. Many artists and curators are developing independent, agile, and research-oriented approaches that operate outside—or on the margins—of traditional institutional frameworks. The challenge remains to transform this vitality into a more stable ecosystem without neutralizing its experimental potential.Bergamo was the painful epicenter of the pandemic. 

“It made evident that a cultural institution cannot exist outside of its context; it is always embedded within social, political, and emotional conditions that shape its responsibility.“

To what extent has this traumatic experience changed your work?

The experience of Bergamo has had a profound impact, not in a thematic or representational sense, but in terms of institutional awareness. It made evident that a cultural institution cannot exist outside of its context; it is always embedded within social, political, and emotional conditions that shape its responsibility. From this perspective, the museum is no longer simply a space of representation, but a situated form of public agency, called upon to respond, to listen, and to remain active within the complexity of the present.

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