Creative Mediators

Ippolito Pestellini Laparelli

Mirjam Varadinis

Bregtje Van Der Haak

Andrés Jaque

Ippolito Pestellini Laparelli

Ippolito is an italian architect and partner at OMA. Ippolito’s work has a focus on preservation, scenography and curation. Current and recent projects include the renovation of Kaufhaus des Westens (KaDeWe) in Berlin (ongoing); Panda, a research and exhibit for the 2016 Oslo Triennale, which explores the impact of sharing economy platforms; the transformative design of the 16th century Fondaco dei Tedeschi in Venice (2016); Monditalia, a multi-disciplinary exhibition focused on the current status of Italy, at the 2014 Venice Architecture Biennale; scenography for the Greek theatre of Syracuse in Sicily (2012); and the co-curation of Cronocaos, OMA’s exhibition on preservation at the 2010 Venice Architectural Biennale. In addition, Ippolito is responsible for a wide range of projects for Prada and the Fondazione Prada. Ippolito studied architecture at the Politecnico di Milano and at TU Delft.

Mirjam Varadinis

Mirjam has been curator and art historian at Kunsthaus Zürich since September 2002. She is in charge of contemporary art and has organized various exhibitions, including among others, the group shows “Action!” (2016) and “Shifting Identities” (2008), as well as solo exhibitions with Akram Zaatari, Javier Téllez, Haris Epaminonda, Rosa Barba, Roman Ondák, Adrian Paci, Mircea Cantor, Tino Sehgal, Erik van Lieshout, Nedko Solakov, Urs Fischer and David Shrigley a.o. She has published numerous catalogues and artist books and contributes to international art magazines. In 2013, Mirjam Varadinis curated “0 Performance – The Fragile Beauty of Crisis”, a special project for the 5th Moscow Biennial of Contemporary Art. In 2012, she co-curated “TRACK” (together with Philippe Van Cauteren), a large-scale, city-wide international group exhibition in the tradition of “Chambres d’amis” in Ghent, Belgium. In 2006, Varadinis was also a curator of “Printemps de Septembre”, an annual festival of contemporary art in Toulouse, France.

Bregtje Van Der Haak

Bregtje is a documentary filmmaker and journalist. Since 1997, she has been directing international documentaries and transmedia projects on long-term social change with a special focus on urbanization and technological culture. Her documentaries include Saudi Solutions, DNA Dreams, Satellite Queens, Lagos Wide & Close and Atlas of Pentecostalism, and have been shown on television, in film festivals and in art exhibitions around the world. Van der Haak was the first woman filmmaker to film the lives of working women in Saudi Arabia in 2006 and was honoured with the Media Woman of the Year award. Van der Haak regularly directs episodes of the VPRO Backlight Series on Future Affairs and is a board member of the Prince Claus Fund and the Erasmus Prize. She studied dance in Paris, political science and law at the University of Amsterdam and the New School for Social Research in New York, and journalism at the Graduate School of Journalism at Columbia University in New York. She has been a Visiting Professor at USC Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism and the School of Creative Media at the City University of Hong Kong.

Andrés Jaque

Andrés is an artist, architect and scholar based in New York and Madrid. He is the founder of the Office of Political Innovation, an international practice that works in the intersection of research, politics and design. He a recipient of the 10th Frederick Kiesler Prize; the Silver Lion for the Best Research Project at the 14th Venice Biennale; Alfred Toepfer Stiftung’s Tessenow Stipendiat; the Dionisio Hernández Gil Award and the Architectural Record’s Designer of the Year award. He is PhD Architect (ETSAM) Professor at Columbia University GSAPP and Visiting Professor of Princeton University SoA. His publications include Everyday Politics, SUPERPOWERS OF TEN; PHANTOM. Mies as Rendered Society; Different Kinds of Water Pouring into a Swimming Pool and Dulces Arenas Cotidianas. His work has been shown at Museum of Modern Art, MoMA, ZKM Kalsruhe, MAK Austrian Museum in Vienna, CalArts Center for Contemporary Arts, Schweizerisches Architektur Museum in Basel, Z33 Hasselt, Cité de l'Architecture et du Patrimoine de Paris, JUMEX Museum, Tel Aviv Museum of Arts, Mostra di Architettura de la Bienal de Venezia, Gwangju Biennale, Lisbon Architecture Triennale, Chicago Architecture Biennial and London Design Museum.

Leoluca Orlando, Mayor of the City of Palermo, Hedwig Fijen, Director of Manifesta, and Ippolito Pestellini Laparelli, partner at OMA, are delighted to announce the Creative Mediator team for the 12th edition of Manifesta, held in Palermo, Italy, 2018.

The Office for Metropolitan Architecture (OMA) has been invited by the Director of Manifesta, Hedwig Fijen, to mediate the complex architectural and urban structure of the city of Palermo, and investigate the role of city governance and address how contemporary cities are affected by tourism, gentrification, migration and climate change. The result of this investigation is a Palermo Atlas by OMA for Manifesta 12, an interdisciplinary urban study of the city completed by the architecture office in July 2017 and presented in the newly re-opened Teatro Garibaldi by the Mayor of Palermo Leoluca Orlando, Director of Manifesta Hedwig Fijen and Manifesta 12 Creative Mediator and OMA architect, Ippolito Pestellini Laparelli.

The outcomes of the Palermo Atlas will be translated into an accessible biennial program by four Creative Mediators, Italian architect and partner at OMA, Ippolito Pestellini Laparelli; Dutch filmmaker and journalist, Bregtje van der Haak; Spanish architect and scholar based in New York, Andrés Jaque; and Swiss contemporary art curator, Mirjam Varadinis. This newly invented biennial model of collaborative research, made by an urban office working together with a team of interdisciplinary mediators, is functioning as a curatorial intervention in the city of Palermo. This format corresponds perfectly with how a nomadic event like Manifesta can create a solid legacy in the host city.

By fusing different disciplines and rooting itself in a holistic urban research, Manifesta 12 hopes to extend its impact beyond just engaging audiences with contemporary art, but towards providing Palermo citizens with tools to imagine the future of their city.

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