The Ship of Tolerance will take place in May of 2023!

Ilya and Emilia Kabakov Foundation is happy to announce the Ship of Tolerance, a large-scale off-site project to be presented as an official satellite program in Chicago, running concurrently with theeighth edition of EXPO CHICAGO September 16 through October 2019.

The Chicago Ship is an extension of the international program of Tolerance initiated by Ilya and Emilia Kabakov in 2005.

In September, The Kabakov Foundation and Art, Action Change will bring The Ship of Tolerance to London to be unveiled on the River as the centrepiece art installation of Totally Thames 2019.

The Ship of Tolerance is produced in the UK by Art Action Change, a cross-cultural platform founded by Nadja Romain to foster dialogue through art projects, films, books and cultural events.

On May 19th, 2018, the Ship of Tolerance will be officially inaugurated with a huge party in the city harbor. After Easter of 2018, in the period from 08th April to 22nd April 2018, a team of carpenters will build the ship in Rostock, Germany. In March, the Russian-American artist, Emilia Kabakov, is expected to come to Rostock where she will attend schools and kindergartens workshops, where children will be painting the ship sails.

The Ship of Tolerance, an invitation to tolerance involving young generations was housed in the square of the Accademia di Belle Arti in Rome. On 25 and 26 May, one of  Ilya and Emilia Kabakov’s  longest projects  was at the Cavalry Square in Via Ripetta, home of the Academy of Fine Arts in Rome, who coordinated the construction site and hosted the work until June 30th. Even the Coro Voci Bianche took part in an exhibition that was held on Thursday 25 May at the Teatro dell’Ara Pacis in Rome, under The Ship of Tolerance , an intervention dedicated to the theme of tolerance and respect for other cultures ideas, addressed to schools of every order and degree.

The twenty-foot-long wooden boat, whose sails were made up of paintings by children of different ages, cultures, ethnicities and geographic origin, on the theme of tolerance, hope and dialogue between cultures arrived in Capalbio in 2017.

With the project Ship of Tolerance presented by the Ilya and Emilia Kabakov Foundation, the Kunsthaus Zug invites the public to reflect on the themes of tolerance and respect. The Kunsthaus is thus offering an artistic contribution to one of society’s major current topics while taking part in the artist’s duo global project. The Ship of Tolerance will be inaugurated in Zug on September 10.

The Ship of Tolerance – a collaborative art project created by renowned Russian artists Ilya and Emilia Kabakov – arrived in Moscow in 2013 following an international tour.

From early May until the beginning of September 2013, over 300 students from schools across Moscow participated in the Ship of Tolerance project, making sails for an 18 meter-high wooden ship.

The Ilya and Emilia Kabakov Foundation, in a joint collaboration with Studio in a School, will present The Ship of Tolerance, in Brooklyn Bridge Park on September 27, 2013 as part of the 17th annual DUMBO Arts Festival. The work will remain on view on the Brooklyn waterfront until October 6th.

The Miami rendition of the Ship of Tolerance took place on the Watson Island waterfront 2012 in conjunction with the Miami Children’s Museum and Art Basel Maimi Beach.

Access to the Ship was free.

With its commanding presence and message of peace and unity, Ilya and Emilia Kabakov‘s Ship of Tolerance stood out amidst the other artworks at the eleventh annual Havana Biennial, in May of 2012.

The Ship of Tolerance project was modeled after an ancient Egyptian sailing craft. They supplied history and art books and collaborated with local teachers to conduct workshops. With the help of a volunteer artist, the eager youngsters incorporated what they learned into their own paintings of ships, which were printed onto the structure’s sail.

Launched in 2011 during the Sharjah Bienniale, the Ship of Tolerance was a particularly influential piece given the complex issues facing the Middle East and the fact that local children had very limited exposure to painting given local religious customs and traditions. For some of them it was a first time drawing and creating images based on their lives and understanding of their culture. The project was presented by The Department of Culture and Information, Sharjah, and curated by Galerie Brigitte Schenk, Cologne.

The San Moritz version of the Ship of Tolerance was sent gently bobbing on Lake Moritz in 2010 for the Art Master’s Festival and won the prestigious Cartier Award for the best art project of the year. The project in St. Moritz gave a unique opportunity to see the issues of Tolerance from the eyes of the kids growing in a relatively safe and prosperous environment.

“ The idea was to connect children with the world, to make them think about how life could be very different and yet very much the same for other kids,”

Emilia Kabakov.

The Ship of Tolerance was launched in 2009 during the famous Venice Bianelle and celebrated this city’s unique relationship with the sea, ancient international ties, and rich culture. One of the more interesting aspects that arose was that local children tended to interpret tolerance from the perspective of intra-family relationships. One child suggested to give toys to all the parents that they could share and never have to fight.

The first Ship of Tolerance was built in 2005 in Siwa – a remote Egyptian oasis in the Sahara desert – close to the Libyan border. The town of Siwa is surrounded by saltwater lakes but surprisingly many of the kids have never seen a boat before or have painted large-scale art works.

“This work is about dreams,” explained Emilia Kabakov.