The 2025 programme of Conciliazione 5, a new space for contemporary art conceived by the Holy See's Dicastery for Culture and Education, has been curated by Cristiana Perrella: it is a gateway to art and its ability to engage with the major issues of our time in a free and profound way, generating new questions and new thoughts and thus opening up the possibility of transformation, which is significant not only on a cultural and civil level but also on a spiritual level. Each artist had the opportunity to express their art in two spaces: in Via della Conciliazione and in a location outside the Vatican, which varied according to the theme but was in dialogue with the works inside the gallery.
Vivian Suter
The protagonist of the third instalment of the Conciliazione 5 project is Vivian Suter's installation, on display from 13 October to 4 December 2025, preceded by Yan Pei-Ming and Adrian Paci and followed by Jonathas de Andrade.
The exhibition continues at another venue, the Serra Monumentale in the nearby Botanical Gardens of Rome, at Largo Cristina di Svezia 23A.
Created outdoors in the Guatemalan rainforest where she lives, the works of Swiss-Argentinian artist Vivian Suter (Buenos Aires, 1949) are the result of an intimate connection with the natural elements. Rain, earth, humidity, dog paw prints, traces of plant and animal organisms all leave their mark on the canvases, overlapping the energetic brushstrokes, bright colours and abstract shapes. Suter recognises that nature plays an important role in the completion of her work, leaving the final result open to chance and the unexpected. Immersively staged to suggest the lush visual richness of the tropical environment in which they are created, these works remind us that human beings are part of a larger, interconnected world. Conveying an ecological sensibility, they invite us to “take care of our common home” (Encyclical Laudato si', Pope Francis, 2015).
Curator Cristiana Perrella
