The cultural offerings of the Cavalese Museum of Contemporary Art continue to impress. Following the acclaimed exhibition by Marinella Senatore, the museum now presents Performa, a festival of performing arts focused on experimentation across contemporary languages and participatory practices. While the name evokes New York’s ‘Performa’ biennale, this iteration takes a more intimate yet equally ambitious form in Trentino.
Conceived and curated by director Elsa Barbieri, Performa Cavalese is designed to activate the museum as a dynamic space. The programming moves beyond traditional exhibitions to foster dialogue and shared artistic production. A key aim of the project is to build a long-term “mapping of a new generation of Trentino artists.” Over three weeks, one artist per week—Leonardo Panizza (April 15-19), Johannes Bosisio (April 22-26), and Angelo Demitri Morandini (April 29-May 3)—will engage with the museum, the public, and the town of Cavalese.
The festival follows a progressive schedule, with Saturdays serving as the central public engagement days. These include workshops, talks, and shared actions that transform the museum into a lively, participatory environment. We spoke with Elsa Barbieri during the festival’s second week to learn more.
Director, Performa Cavalese seems to transform the museum from an exhibition space into an active and participatory one, a direction that has also emerged in your recent projects like the exhibitions of Marinella Senatore and Fulvio Morella, which directly involved the local community. The Cavalese Museum of Contemporary Art has indeed developed a strong participatory dimension over the past two years, complementing exhibitions with activities for schools, adults, and the local area. How did this project come about, and what kind of experience do you hope to create for the public?
“This project was a flash of inspiration last December, amidst the opening of Marinella Senatore’s exhibition and the planning for the 2026 program. On one hand, it fulfills my long-stated desire for a living museum, one that is participatory and inhabited by its people. On the other hand, it has a very personal foundation. I graduated with a thesis titled ‘What Remains of a Performance,’ and from the beginning of my tenure, alongside Thomas De Falco, I’ve never hidden my love for this artistic language. Bringing it here, to Cavalese, is certainly a gamble, but one that is bringing me great satisfaction. Seeing the residents of Cavalese become passionate, seeing them engage with curiosity and participation with different artists each time makes me very happy because I believe in relationships and in the museum as a space and an experience for connection.”
For this edition, you’ve chosen to feature Trentino artists with very diverse practices. What criteria guided this selection, and what themes are you interested in exploring through their artistic research?
“The criterion is always one: I fall in love. I’m aware this is more romantic than scientific, but that’s how it is. I’ve known Leonardo Panizza for a few years, even before I was considered ‘from Trentino,’ as some say. I first encountered Johannes Bosisio’s work in his studio in Trodena about two years ago. And Angelo Demitri Morandini was a delightful surprise during the last Bologna Art City. I was at Palazzo Isolani with Anneliese Pichler, for a renewed collaboration with Booming Contemporary Art Show, when Angelo and I met. We immediately felt a great connection, which won’t be limited to Performa – though that’s a spoiler I’ll share next year! The artists have different research and practices, and that’s the interesting aspect. Performa is not just a relay race; it’s also an original artistic encounter that allows us to understand the link between reality and representation as it dialectically exists within a work. There’s a tendency to define a work—or a performance—as real because it’s immediate, but in reality, what is perceived as immediate is often a skillfully mediated relationship. Videos, installations, paintings, and waxy surfaces are all devices that, in different ways and with varying levels of engagement, bring us closer to the idea that no matter how much a work engages with reality, or how reality is understood or imagined beyond representation, it’s also true that much depends on the use of representational techniques.”
Within Performa, Saturdays are the central focus with workshops, talks, and participatory performances. How important is the language of performance to you today, and how can it foster a more direct relationship between the artist, the institution, and the public?
“What happens on Saturdays within Performa Cavalese is of fundamental importance to me. It’s the moment of connection, where the public, those participating, discover that the meaning of what is happening is not solely guided by a conceptual framework or an experiment the artist sets in motion, but that it also and especially resides in what unfolds, in the gestures and processes that occur. Leonardo Panizza, for example, involved the public in a walk that provided an opportunity to experiment with a ‘viewer’ he patented and a local artisan realized. This viewer unexpectedly turned out to be a relational device: its elongated shape and weight made it impossible to use without ‘a hand,’ another person to assist. The language of performance, in its infinite variations, is inherently direct contact, primary reactions, mobile energy, and relationship—a local relationship, to be precise and to recall ART VITAL—determined in its content by the occasion that gives it voice and brings it to light.”
The objective is to make Performa Cavalese a recurring event. How do you envision the project evolving over the years, and what role could it play in the national contemporary art scene?
“No predetermined ending, as one might say, to stay on theme. But yes, absolutely! I envision it being proposed in the coming years of my mandate, always in the same format: three weeks, three artists from Trentino, three works or groups of works, and a performative or participatory moment. The goal is also to create a final exhibition, a celebration, and, importantly, a catalog that can serve as an initial mapping of a new generation of Trentino artists.”
