Different destinies: boy evicted from Venice goes to Basel while the Major is on trial

 

A year ago, in Venice, “Boy with frog” by the american artist Charles Ray was removed from Punta della Dogana’s rooftop. At that time the major of the city, Giorgio Orsoni, claimed that the original iron lamp from the XIX century had to return to its place.

 

Effectively the positioning of “Boy with frog” was authorized by the city in occasion of the show for which this artwork was commissioned (Mapping the studio, 2009), while the original iron lamp was going to be restored. Therefore, even if the idea of preservation adopted by the city government is disputable – for many people the realistic sculpture of a boy holding a frog is still more interesting than a banal lamp with no specific purpose – four years after that show Orsoni was right to insist on the substitution. “The Repubblica dei Dogi – he said – didn’t allow to place sculptures in the Venetian squares, and neither do we.”

 

However the destiny of the pedantic Giorgio Orsoni and the irreverent “Boy with frog” has been slightly different. While the Boy is currently on show at the Kunstmuseum in Basel, that is celebrating Charles Ray’s career with an impressive solo retrospective show, the lawyer Orsoni is not the Major of Venice anymore. He was arrested last month, the day of the international preview of the Architecture Biennial, for he is supposed to be involved in the big scandal of the Mose – the gigantic system of moving barriers designed to protect Venice from high waters. Now he is on trial.

 

 

September 7, 2014