“Monte di Pietà” is a venture conceived by artist Christoph Büchel, in its Venice venue, Ca’ Nook della Regina.

Initially the house of Venetian retailers Nook di San Cassiano, Ca’ Nook della Regina was constructed between 1724 and 1728 on the ruins of the Gothic palazzo by which Caterina Nook, the long run Queen of Cyprus, was born in 1454. In 1800, the constructing grew to become the property of Pope Pius VII, who assigned it to the charitable Congregation of the Padri Cavanis. From 1834 to 1969, it hosted the Monte di Pietà (Mount of Piety) of Venice, whereas, in 1975, it grew to become the Historic Archive of the Venice Biennale and has been the Venice everlasting house of Fondazione Prada since 2011.

The layered historical past of the constructing is Büchel’s framework for setting up an articulated community of spatial, financial, and cultural references. “Monte di Pietà” is a deep dive into the notion of debt as the basis of human society and the first car by which political and cultural energy is exercised. Traditionally, a crossroads of business and creative trade and intermingling, the town of Venice is a perfect context for exploring the relationships between these complicated subjects and the deep dynamics of up to date society.

The venture develops in an immersive surroundings, taking up the palazzo, particularly its floor ground, mezzanine and first ground. It consists of a fictitious bankrupt pawnshop primarily based on the unique structure of the Monte di Pietà of Venice. Christoph Büchel’s work The Diamond Maker (2020-), a suitcase containing lab-grown diamonds, is on view on this context. It outcomes from a bodily and symbolic means of destruction and transformation of the artist’s complete physique of artworks in his possession, together with those from his youth and childhood and people but to be created. The diamonds have been realized by ALGORDANZA AG, an organization based in 2004 in Switzerland that produces memorial diamonds globally. “Monte di Pietà” incorporates new productions and references of installations beforehand conceived by Christoph Büchel, a heterogeneous collection of objects, paperwork, historic and modern artworks associated to property historical past, credit score and finance, the event of collections and archives, and the creation and which means of actual or synthetic wealth.

“Monte di Pietà” additionally explored the blurred boundaries between the bodily and digital dimensions of our contemporaneity. By means of the web exercise of a granfluencer and the activation of a cryptocurrency, the venture offers immateriality and volatility of monetary transactions within the digital sphere that, in an nearly alchemical course of, burn wealth to supply new worth. The speculative mechanisms typical of cryptocurrencies are bent in favor of people that have been born or are residents of Municipality of Venice. This token, referred to as Schei and promoted on TikTok by the granfluencer Regina de schei, goals to create new revenue and distribute it to Venetian inhabitants.

Originating in Fifteenth-century Italy, the Catholic establishments referred to as Monte di Pietà gave the poor entry to loans at affordable rates of interest. They used funds from charitable donors as capital and made loans to low-income folks. Debtors provided valuables as collateral, making the Monte di Pietà a company on the borderline between a pawnshop and a financial institution. Every object was related to a private historical past, debt and mutual credit score, an rate of interest and a sale value in case the debtor has not returned to pay the curiosity and credit score in a given interval. After a number of unsuccessful makes an attempt between the sixteenth and 18th centuries, the Banco Pignoratizio Comunale (Municipal Foreclosures Financial institution) was established in Venice in 1806. In 1822, an area financial institution, the Cassa di Venezia, was created and opened to the general public. Related to the Banco Pignoratizio, it might finance via the gathering of financial savings pledge lending operations. In 1834, the Institute was named Monte di Pietà of Venice and relocated to the distinguished venue of Ca’ Nook della Regina.

In Western historical past, debt, digital cash and the beginning of foreign money are intrinsically linked to the administration of energy that allows growth and accumulation. Debt has all the time performed a necessary function in social and political upheavals, and rulers have repeatedly applied debt cancellations all through historical past, typically used to revive the earlier social order. Particularly, the Republic of Venice was a mercantile state that contributed to the beginning of contemporary debt-based monetary markets and the authorized recognition of mental property. Debt can also be intently associated to the practices of storage and accumulation of tangible and intangible assets. The artwork system, particularly museum establishments, performs a big function in preserving heritages and collections and assigning symbolic and financial worth to items and objects.

by Fondazione Prada at Ca’ Corner della Regina, Venice
till November 24, 2024