Ghetto Redux

Ghetto Redux is a large-scale, multi-disciplinary project, commissioned by Shifting Vision in partnership with the Medici Archive Project.

Ghetto Redux will feature new works by six world-renowned contemporary artists, created in response to records of the Jewish Ghetto in Florence discovered in the historic Medici Archive. The intention is for a global, non-denominational project, exploring themes relating to the history, experience and universal concept of the term ‘ghetto’, as well as aspects of the Florentine ghetto and its inhabitants revealed by the archive.

Shifting Vision is collaborating with Mousse Magazine and Publishing to produce a series of publications about Ghetto Redux and the Florentine Ghetto, featuring essays and interviews by participating artists and historians. The first publication, including an illustrated introduction to the project with a map of the Florentine Ghetto, will be published in the January 2024 edition of Mousse Magazine.

Further information on the launch of Ghetto Redux will be announced in Spring 2024

The Florentine Ghetto was built by the Medici family in the 16th century, with the Medici maintaining control over the rent, trade and governance of its inhabitants until the 18th century. The ghetto was demolished in the 19th century following Italian unification. The Medici Archive Project (MAP) was established in 2013 to research, archive and publish thousands of documents which describe in fascinating detail the everyday life and events of Jews living in the Florentine Ghetto. The name of every resident, the blueprint of every apartment, the professional activities that went on inside and outside of its walls, the mapping of Jewish mercantile networks and the art, music and science produced by its inhabitants over 2 centuries are all recorded in the archive.

The exhibition, The Jews and The Medici featuring documents and artefacts from the Medici Archive, will be staged at the Palazzo Pitti, Florence 23rd October – 28th January 2024