In 2004 UniCredit Group launched UniCredit & Art, a strategic cultural investment project. Inaugurated in Italy, it focuses on the promotion of emerging talents in the visual arts, music, theatre and literature.
Activities are carried out via a partnership system that now encompasses long-term projects in all of the countries where the Group is active – across a geographical area extending from southern Italy to the Baltic countries, from Germany and Austria to Eastern Europe and Turkey.
The commitment is made concrete both in our collection of works by young artists – which has updated our vast historical collection through new acquisitions and commissions – and in our participation in financing art projects and even providing housing for young artists – usually through programs involving cooperation with our museum partners.
In Italy in the past four years over €6 million has been invested in acquiring works by young artists, and our activities are now expanding all across Europe.
The nature of the project expresses our corporate identity and is characterized by several key foundational pillars, as described by a research study undertaken by the Venice University Institute of Architecture (IUAV):
- an approach that guarantees great attention to the local cultural context without ever losing touch with an international perspective. Close cooperation with local artists helps them achieve international visibility;
- a long-term outlook based on social responsibility and sustainability, setting aside short-term market prospects, the search for the “star of the moment” and other near-term tactical behavior;
- special attention to current creativity among young people – with all the attendant implications of experimentation and risk-taking in the making of acquisition choices – and an interest not merely in well-known personalities but in promising talents with substantial bodies of work and exhibition histories;
- a focus on innovative educational methods, including training courses that make use of contemporary art (“art-based learning”) and which involve employees and other stakeholders;
- an interest in the development of the art scene as a whole – but especially in the development of the cultural establishment – as expressed through initiating partnerships with major entities and institutions.
