The “ad occhi chiusi…” Prize, based on collaboration between Artissima and Fondazione Merz, is inserted in the research activities of the foundation on young art of the Mediterranean, and offers an international artist selected from the participants at the fair in 2022 the possibility of a residency in Sicily. The research conducted during the residency period will be presented in the programming of Fondazione Merz.

The title of the prize takes its cue from a phrase by Marisa Merz, “When the eyes are closed they are extraordinarily open”, which prompts us to rethink how the artists – in the opacity of the general media riot, packed with images that are too fast and too superficial to be able to describe reality – offer a truly personal vantage point. Palermo and Sicily represent multifaceted territories containing multiple points of observation and perception, in which contradictions and resolutions coexist, starting from cultural, linguistic and narrative stratification. Territories in which sensory as well as physical boundaries are repositioned and altered by the actions of men and women in incessant transit. Due to this characteristic, these are places in which to look at things while remembering that “when the eyes are closed they are extraordinarily open”.

Each year the award will focus on a theme indicated by an international jury of experts, who will select the winner during the days of Artissima.

The winners of the previous editions were: Heba Y. Amin (2021), Nona Inescu (2022), Marwa Arsanios (2023), and Monia Ben Hamouda (2024).

Jury “ad occhi chiusi…” Prize 2024 by Fondazione Merz:
Beatrice Merz, President, Fondazione Merz, Turin
Giulia Turconi, Assistant Curator, Fondazione Merz, Turin
Marta Mestre, Curator, MAC/CCB Museum of Contemporary Art, Lisbon
Antonia Scintilla, Director, Fondation Pernod Ricard, Paris