SEATS OF UNDERSTANDING - 15th international design contest - trieste contemporanea

PREMISES

The 15th edition of the contest runs in unison with the EU Slovenia-Italy cross-border project for Nova Gorica and Gorizia, designated European Capital of Culture (ECoC) in 2025. In preparing the ECoC event, organising bodies from the two cities (which form one continuous urban area on the border) declare to “share the same commitment: being the European Capital of Borderless Culture”.

So, the competition is an initiative towards the “GO! 2025 – Nova Gorica and Gorizia European Capital of Culture 2025” event, and produced by the Trieste Contemporanea Committee with the support of the Regione Autonoma Friuli Venezia Giulia. It is carried out under the patronage of the Central European Initiative, which also has provided for one of its main prizes since 2006, and in collaboration with the Studio Tommaseo in Trieste.

THEME

This edition of the competition seeks a potentially iconic item of street furniture that could represent symbolic meanings linked to historical location of Nova Gorica/Gorizia, and the sharing of cultural values. Street furniture is more than just a functional tool, it embodies social values and community action. As such, does it have the potential to also influence and shape those values and action? What can be sustainably transmitted in this location, at this point in time, through urban design to future citizens? The contestant should design a seating installation (e.g. a bench) with the above concept and sentiments and of course for resting, viewing the panorama and socializing. The symbolic roots linked to the history, culture and sentiments of the two GO! 2025 cities) _ max 2500 characters.

PANEL OF JUDGES

The panel of judges, consisting of international experts and representatives from the Central European Initiative and Trieste Contemporanea, will select a number of best designs and award the contest’s prizes. The panel’s decisions shall be final.

The Trieste Contemporanea website will announce the names of the members of the jury by April 15, 2024 and publish their decisions by June 15, 2024.

about us

Trieste Contemporanea is a hub of proposals and information on contemporary art. Since more than twenty years we've promoted “Dialogues with the Art of Central Eastern Europe”, and in the perfect Italian city where to do it: Trieste.

If you pass in Via del Monte you will find exhibitions, meetings, workshops (that merge you in the most advanced specialist research), but also a more informal atmosphere for enjoying, for example, a "videospritz" (a format we conceived at the beginning of the new century for chatting with important video artists or excellent emerging video artists while sipping an aperitif). You can find the experience of a consolidated European network of artists and curators or you can learn about a history of art which Italian people is not yet very familiar to.

Young artists have many opportunities here: they can apply to the Young European Artist Award, submit a project to the International Design Contest, or to the SQUEEZE IT Contest, at the European crossroads of visual arts, theatre and new media, or join other activities, as the last experimental Harbor for Cultures project, which draws inspiration from possible development visions of the Old Port of Trieste.

Trieste Contemporanea also has its own library of contemporary art, which is part of the National Library System, through the University of Trieste Pole, and is a registered venue for university internships.

The Trieste Contemporanea Committee was founded in 1995; we run our activity through collaborations, co-productions and exchanges on an international level, involving European public bodies, institutions and cultural organizations, and initiatives dedicated to visual art, music, cinema, literature, multimedia, theatre, architecture and design have been held in Trieste and abroad; a long collaboration with the Central European Initiative (CEI) has listed since 2003 among the CEI Feature Events our Venice Forum for Contemporary Art Curators (which deals with topics of exchange of curatorial experiences in occasion of the opening of the Venice Biennale), and is regularly assigning the CEI Award of our International Design Competition; the committee is recipient for the period 2017-2019 of a funding from the Autonomous Region of Friuli Venezia Giulia; in 2003, we proposed to a number of institutions, museums and organizations from Central and Eastern Europe to participate in the Continental Breakfast project, a network now shared by partners from Bulgaria, Croatia, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Poland, Serbia, Slovenia and Turkey.