Landing by helicopter at a women’s prison where the Vatican has set up its pavilion for the Venice Biennale international art exhibition, Pope Francis on Sunday told the women imprisoned there that they had a “special place in my heart.”
“Grazie,” a woman shouted. Others applauded.
Many of the women had participated with artists in creating works that are displayed throughout the prison for the exhibition titled “With My Eyes.” Francis, the first pope to visit, albeit briefly, a Venice Biennale, said it was “fundamental” that the prison system “offer detainees the tools and space for human, spiritual, cultural and professional growth, creating the conditions for their healthy reintegration.”
“Not to isolate dignity, but to give new possibilities,” Francisco said to applause.
Over the decades, countries participating in the Biennale, the world’s premier showcase of new art, have used deconsecrated churches, former breweries, water buses and various other sites to showcase their art, but this was the first time that a prison was selected.
That made the project “more complex and more difficult to implement,” Bruno Racine, director of two Pinault Collection locations in Venice and co-curator of the Vatican Pavilion, said in an interview. But the scenario is consistent with Francis’ message of inclusion toward marginalized people, he added.
The Vatican project has received an overwhelmingly positive public reception, but it has not been without controversy. Some critics raised ethical concerns about the intersection of powerful institutions like the Vatican and the Biennale with the limited autonomy of incarcerated women. Others suggested that the Vatican, in putting on the show, was complicit in a penal system in which overcrowding remains a serious problem.
Others demanded that the Pope request pardons or at least reduced sentences for any women who were imprisoned for having responded violently to domestic abuse.
“I don’t think the Vatican has the power to have any influence on Italian justice,” Racine said of that idea.
While the Vatican has not publicly responded to criticism, Francis has been consistently outspoken about domestic abuse, saying in 2021 that there was something “almost satanic” about the high number of cases of domestic violence against women.
He has also been a strong advocate for prison reform, denouncing overcrowding and often meeting with inmates during his travels.
On Sunday, Francis said the prison was “a harsh reality, and problems such as overcrowding, lack of facilities and resources and episodes of violence generate great suffering there.” But he said prison could also be a place where people’s dignity could be “promoted through mutual respect and the nurturing of talents and abilities, perhaps dormant or imprisoned by the vicissitudes of life.”
The pope described his artistic vision to the artists he called to the Sistine Chapel last year, telling them to “think about the poor and ensure that art reaches the peripheries,” the Vatican’s culture chief, the cardinal, said earlier Thursday. José Tolentino de Mendonça. year. On Sunday, Francis told artists involved in the Vatican project that “the world needs artists.”
The curators, Mr. Racine and Chiara Parisi, of the Center Pompidou-Metz, the French museum, selected a handful of artists to work with the incarcerated women and create works that are scattered around the prison.
One, a 1965 silkscreen with the word Hope upside down, hung above the door of the prison dining room, where about a quarter of the 80 inmates who agreed to serve as show guides first meet visitors. The screen print was created by artist Corita Kent, a former nun and social justice activist who died in 1986.
Lebanese artist Simone Fattal transcribed poems and reflections by imprisoned women onto lava slabs lining a brick hallway: “I thought I was suffocating.” “I often think about my family.” “I am so sad.”
In another room were small stylized paintings by French artist Claire Tabouret based on family photographs the women had given her.
Visitors get only a brief glimpse of prison life, but during the tour a short film, directed by Marco Perego and starring his wife, actress Zoe Saldaña, shows the conditions inside in grim black and white: shared rooms, shared showers, little privacy . . Both inmates and professional actresses acted in the film, Racine said.
This is the third time that the Vatican has participated in the Biennale: in 2013 and 2015, it was among many participants in the Arsenale, one of the fair’s main venues. And for the 2018 Architecture Biennale, the Vatican built a series of chapels, “for both believers and non-believers,” that can still be visited.
On Sunday, the Pope greeted the inmates of the Giudecca prison individually in an interior courtyard. Some gave her flowers and others pressed envelopes and notes in her hands.
Giovanni Russo, head of the Penitentiary Administration Department of the Italian Justice Ministry, told reporters at a news conference at the Vatican in March that women who participated in the project were entitled to unspecified benefits. While the Vatican Pavilion was unique, he said, nearly all of Italy’s 190 penitentiaries had “art projects” of some kind or another, involving more than 20,000 volunteers.
It is not the first time that prison inmates have participated in large artistic projects. Two years ago, French artist Pauline Curnier Jardin worked with inmates to make a film and paint a large common room where the women meet with visitors twice a week. The walls are now a soft purple, decorated with stylized leaves and figures designed by inmates during a series of workshops with the artist.
After the Biennale closes in November, the “With My Eyes” artwork will be removed, Racine said. But Curnier Jardin’s reassuring additions will remain.
After prison, Pope Francis celebrated mass in St. Mark’s Square.
Praising the “charming beauty” of Venice during the homily, he added that the city was also threatened by issues such as climate change, overtourism and “the fragility of buildings, of cultural heritage, but also of people.” that run the risk of wearing down the social fabric of the city. fabric. City officials this week began charging a city access fee, hoping to discourage visitors from coming on especially busy days.
Many tourists hoping to visit St. Mark’s Square on Sunday were hampered by dozens of blockades in the area, part of increased security measures for the pontiff’s visit.
“I’m not upset,” said Julia Suh, visiting from Augusta, Georgia, at one of the blockades as she watched the Mass on her cell phone. “I’m very honored – it’s what they’re supposed to do because of the increased security.”