The cultural, democratic and global project promoted by the Luciano Benetton Collection.

Imago Mundi is a collection comprising over a thousand works of art commissioned and collected by Luciano Benetton on his travels around the world: established and emerging artists from many different countries are engaged on a voluntary basis and without financial reward, to create an artwork whose only limitation is the 10x12cm format.

The collection, hosted by the Fondazione Benetton, has no commercial aspirations, but intends instead to unite the diversities of our world in the name of a common artistic experience, catalogued very differently from the approach usually seen in museums or on the market.

“Imago Mundi is a cultural, democratic and global project that looks to the new frontiers of art – personalities, countries, emerging languages and different cultures – to foster openness towards the world and new horizons, and the coexistence of expressive diversity”, explains Luciano Benetton. “Our aim is to take the collection on a journey, in order to show it – through exhibitions, catalogues and a portal on the web dedicated to art – to the widest possible number of people around the world, in collaboration with private institutions and public museums.” The first stop on Imago Mundi’s journey will be the exhibition in Venice, at the Fondazione Querini Stampalia, as a collateral event of the 55th International Art Exhibition, Venice Biennale.

From 28th August to 27th October 2013, collections from the United States, Japan, India, South Korea and Australia (Aboriginal art) will be presented to the public. There are over 200 artworks from each country, grouped according to nationality, regions and continents, so as to present the collection – in addition to the intrinsic significance of the works themselves – as an account of the journeys of Luciano Benetton around the world, through the filter of art.

The Imago Mundi exhibition was designed by the architect Tobia Scarpa as a welcoming space that aids comprehension of the richness of the exhibit: the structure provides clear visibility of the small canvasses and, thanks to the display stands that close like the leaves of a book, is easy to transport and install, facilitating the itinerant aims of the collection, destined to travel without frontiers. Coordination: Casabella laboratorio. Visual identity and exhibition graphic design: Tassinari/Vetta.

In addition to the five countries presented for the first time in Venice, Imago Mundi includes collections from Latin America, Eastern Europe, Russia, China and Mongolia and currently gathers more than 2000 paintings. The project will head south for its next collections, to recount the creative, artistic and social ferment of the African continent.