Carrara city-workshop
Bruno Corà [curatore XVI simposio internazionale di scultura]

For the 2005 edition of the International Symposium of Sculpture a very special topic has been chosen: "lavoro senza fine… fine del lavoro" (“endless work… the end and the aim of the work” N.d.T) is actually a title that sounds like a word play, offers many reading levels and that is fit to various interpretations. The aim is to link the artistic expression with the theme of “working” that usually concerns quite exclusively the world of economy or sociology, of politic or trade unions.

The topic intends to offer young artists stimulating hints, directed to interesting and different interpretations and fields of research: the word “fine” in the title has actually a double meaning since it can be translated in English both as “aim” or “end”; the title could then be referred as well to the contaminations between the materiality of work and its aim/end.

In the last century theories about the “end of the work” had been re-proposed: even if the points of views and the prospects are changed, today the world economic crisis has opened again the social matter that poses strongly the problems linked – directly or indirectly – with the theme of “work”..

The lack of jobs, the precariousness, the conditions of employment and joblessness are again the main concern even in the wealthiest society that had advanced in the last decades of the 20th century the idea of a possible and progressive deliverance form labor and even some theories about the “end of work”. The movements fighting for the liberation from work have made a long and important way that has marked the last two centuries..

The entire modern history has been marked by the work not only in regards to the ways of productions but also as to the very culture: labor for the first time hasn’t just been a mere instrument but it’s a value of its own shared and supported both by laical and religious world.

In order to deal and go through the many hints of this topic – that is inspiring the sculptors taking part to the Symposium – debates and meetings will take place in Piazza Alberica, in the center of Carrara, livening up the summer evenings with the participation of the public.