Bronx, New York; November 2002 — The Bronx Museum of the Arts is pleased to present The Gift: Generous Offerings, Threatening Hospitality, a traveling exhibition organized and circulated by Independent Curators International, that investigates the intricacies of personal relationships through artwork that focus on the giving and receiving of gifts. The Gift features more than forty works of art—photography, video, sculpture and installation—from an international roster of thirty-seven established and emerging artists.

With the aim of shedding light on the multiple meanings veiled in the acts of giving and receiving, The Gift presents works that have been conceived by artists as gifts, dedications, homages, invitations, gestures of hospitality, and gratuitous offerings. Uniting art from the past and works specifically conceived for this exhibition, they range from gifts of objects, one’s self or body to insidious and threatening invitations. Other works explore the relational nature of the work of art and the ambiguous nature of gifts.

“The Gift will bring the best of contemporary art production to the people of New York and the East Coast," says Jenny Dixon, Executive Director. "In so doing, The Bronx Museum builds upon its rich exhibition history, and makes its own contribution by once again inserting the Bronx into the New York landscape as an integral component of the cultural capital of the world."

The Gift: Generous Offerings, Threatening Hospitality is a traveling exhibition organized and circulated by Independent Curators International (ICI), New York in collaboration with the Centro Arte Contemporanea Palazzo delle Papesse, Siena (Italy), which conceived the initial version, co-produced with the Centro Culturale Candiani in Mestre/Venice (Italy). Co-curators for the exhibition are Gianfranco Maraniello, a curator at the Centro Arte Contemporanea Palazzo delle Papesse in Siena (Italy), and Antonio Somaini, a philosopher, art critic, and professor in Milan.

The Gift: Generous Offerings, Threatening Hospitality is accompanied by an illustrated brochure produced by ICI, with an introduction by the curators. Also available is the 350-page bilingual (Italian/English) catalogue of the exhibition presented at the Palazzo delle Papesse, with twenty essays by philosophers, anthropologists, art critics, and comparative literature scholars on the themes of gifts and hospitality.

Exhibition Itinerary
The Gift will travel to Mary and Leigh Block Museum of Art, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL, April 14-June 15, 2003; Art Gallery of Hamilton, Hamilton, Ontario, September 13, 2003–January 2004 and other venues, to be announced, through spring 2004.

Independent Curators International
ICI’s mission is to enhance the understanding and appreciation of contemporary art through traveling exhibitions and other activities that will reach a diverse national and international audience. Collaborating with a wide range of eminent curators, ICI develops its program of innovative traveling exhibitions and substantial catalogues to introduce and document sometimes challenging new work in all mediums by younger, as well as more established artists from the United States and abroad.

Formed in 1975, ICI has created almost 100 exhibitions that collectively have included the work of more than 2,500 artists. ICI exhibitions have been presented by over 450 museums, university art galleries, art centers, and alternative spaces in the United States and abroad. Each year, ICI exhibitions are on view in thirty to forty cities throughout the United States, Canada, and other countries.