BOLOGNA, ITALY.- The Furla Prize for the art, created by Chiara Bertola, is organized and promoted today by Furla Spa, Foundation Querini Stampalia of Venice, MAMbo - Modern Art Museum of Bologna, UniCredit Group, in co-operation with Archivio Viafarini and Arte Fiera. The Prize, created in Venice in 2000 in the premises of the Foundation Querini Stampalia, will come to its Sixth Edition in 2007.

The Prize, which has become biennial from the last edition, in order to allow the many participating professionals, from artists, art critics, curators, museum and art centre directors, both from Italy and abroad, to carry out the tasks comprising the structure of the award, the FURLA Prize for the art has found its rightful place among the events dedicated to young contemporary Italian artists.

The setting up of an international recognized institutional networks and the vitality of the critics' work developed around the latest Italian art have certainly contributed to establish and extend the credibility of all the participants, thus making of the FURLA Prize for the art a fundamental step for many young Italian artists.

The complex mechanism envisages that thirty artists should be invited by a commission and later selected on the basis of their works by two juries, the first - at national level - choosing the five finalist artists, and the second - at international level - naming the winner. Both juries comprise artists, museum directors and curators of international renown. Also the Sixth Edition has envisaged the participation of a foreign juror in the national jury, in order to apply as much as possible strict and detached criteria of judgment.

The five finalists of the Sixth Edition of the Prize are: Alice Cattaneo (Milan, 1976); Elenia Depedro (Breno - BS, 1976); Nicola Gobbetto (Milan, 1980); Luca Trevisani (Verona, 1979); Nico Vascellari (Vittorio Veneto - TV, 1976).

Artists have been selected by a national jury composed of: Chiara Bertola (Curator FURLA Prize for the art); Giulio Ciavoliello (Critic and independend curator); Mario Codognato (Curator of MADRE - Art Museum Donna Regina of Naples); Giacinto Di Pietrantonio (Director of GAMEC in Bergamo); Walter Guadagnini (President of Scientific Commission UniCredit & l'Arte); Gianfranco Maraniello (Director of MAMbo - Modern Art Museum of Bologna); Jonathan Watkins (Director of Ikon Gallery of Birmingham).

The works of the five finalists will be displayed in an exhibition in Villa delle Rose, a venue which is part of MAMbo - Modern Art Museum of Bologna, which will be inaugurated Saturday 27 January 2007, in correspondence with Arte Fiera, and will last till 10 March.

The guest artist of the FURLA Prize for the art 2007 is Mona Hatoum who has created the graphic design of the communication of the Sixth Edition with her work -Routes", as other artists, such as Joseph Kosuth, Ilya Kabakov, Lothar Baumgarten, Michelangelo Pistoletto and Kiki Smith, have done before her. -On mobility" is the title that Mona Hatoum has chosen for the present edition, thus focusing a notion that is driving and permeating the life of contemporary society, both in its more positive impelling need, and in its most evident tragic development.

The idea of mobility inspiring the Sixth Edition of the Prize, is mirrored also in the novelty of turning the cash prize in the possibility for the winner to spend a period of time in the artist's residence of an important European Contemporary Art Museum, in the full understanding that FURLA Prize for the art should expand in a European dimension, in a world where national and continental borders are disappearing. The chosen residence is the Kunstlerhaus Bethenien of Berlin and will be managed and organized by Viafarini, already co-operating with the Prize for the filing of artists' materials sent in the last edition, and an important documentation centre of contemporary art.

Starting from this edition, the FURLA Prize for the art will see the presence of another partner which is the protagonist of the contemporary art scene in Italy: UniCredit Group, an international group which has launched a project for the promotion of young creative resources, starting from Italy, to express the values of dynamism and the capacity to innovate that characterize the Group. The strategy of UniCredit Group is based on the will to generate synergies with other important operators in the cultural scenario leading, as is the case here, to the promotion of excellent initiatives of dissemination of contemporary languages, visibility and training for artists, critical factors of success in today's Italian art.

Another important novelty of the new edition is that a work by the winning artist will become part of the permanent collection of MAMbo - Modern Art Museum of Bologna, confirming the alliance between the towns of Venice, where the Prize was born, and Bologna hosting the prize.

A catalogue in two languages (Italian / English) will document all the phases of the juries, the discussions leading to the selections of the five finalists and the announcing of the winner. There will also be the cards with images and curricula of all the artists participating in the Prize, thus becoming a useful tool to present the work of young Italian artists also to foreign operators.

The winner of the FURLA Prize for the Art will be named Saturday 10 March 2007, in a ceremony to be held in Cappella Farnese of Palazzo D'Accursio in Bologna.