A celebration for the city and for everyone, with free admission on April 25 and 26. On Friday, April 24, the program features the opening of the group exhibition of the Mestre Painting Prize; in September, an exhibition on Klimt, Schiele, Kokoschka, and the body in contemporary art.
Mestre is preparing to welcome a new space dedicated to contemporary art: MUVEC – House of Contemporaneities, the new museum of the Fondazione Musei Civici di Venezia, created through a major transformation of the Muve spaces at the Centro Culturale Candiani. A profound architectural and conceptual rethinking has redefined its functions, visitor flow, and museum mission. The project has given rise to a two-level museum, with a permanent collection and spaces devoted to temporary exhibitions, establishing itself as a new cultural landmark for the city and the wider metropolitan area.
From an architectural point of view, the museum acquires an autonomous and recognizable identity: a dedicated entrance from Piazzale Candiani and an elevated walkway lead visitors to a new reception area located on the second floor. The permanent collection unfolds here, while the third floor is devoted to temporary exhibitions. Two complementary levels, conceived in dialogue between stability and experimentation.
The most significant shift, however, is cultural. MUVEC was created with the aim of narrating modern and contemporary art from 1948 onward, drawing on the civic collections housed at Ca’ Pesaro and presenting them through a thematic, rather than strictly chronological, path. Three main lines structure the narrative: Reconstruction, Construction, and Deconstruction. This framework reflects both the linguistic transformations of art in the second half of the twentieth century and the urban and social history of Mestre, a city that stands as a symbol of Italian contemporaneity.
The museum weaves together two levels of interpretation: on the one hand, the major international trajectories that have crossed Venice and its territory; on the other, the artistic experiences developed on the mainland, alongside the city’s transformation.
Body, matter, and city thus become overarching interpretive keys, capable of bringing into dialogue masters of the twentieth century and more recent research, memory and the present.
The exhibition path presents significant works from the major artistic movements of the second half of the twentieth century and the new millennium, including Informalism, Spatialism, Minimal Art, and contemporary practices investigating space and matter. Alongside major international figures, the museum also gives space to artists connected to the local territory, in a narrative that conveys the complexity and vitality of the artistic scene.
MUVEC positions itself as a contemporary museum in dialogue with its own time: not just an exhibition space, but a cultural device capable of questioning the very meaning of “contemporaneity.” Its location in Mestre represents a strategic and cultural choice, acknowledging a new centrality for the mainland in line with the demographic and social transformations of the area.
In a constantly evolving city, marked by growing cultural plurality, the museum is conceived as a place of encounter and participation for diverse audiences: visitors, students, families, and local communities, with particular attention to new residents of international origin. The exhibition design, cultural mediation, and future programming are all developed in dialogue with these communities, following an inclusive and participatory approach.
MUVEC thus becomes an urban laboratory that interprets contemporaneity from its own position: a crossroads, a margin, and a space for experimentation—a living place called to engage with the challenges of the present and to narrate a city in transformation.
Finally, MUVEC is part of a broader cultural network that includes the Emeroteca dell’Arte (active since 2024), the Casermetta 9 at Forte Marghera (2025), and the future Palaplip factory, contributing to the creation of a true “district of contemporaneity.” Because today, more than ever, to narrate the contemporary means to narrate the city in flux.
