On the second floor of Palazzo Grassi, the Pinault Collection presents an exhibition by Amar Kanwar, bringing together two major multimedia installations by the Indian artist and filmmaker. Kanwar has long developed a practice that intertwines art, documentation, and activism, creating spaces for poetic and political reflection on the dynamics of power, violence, and resistance. His works invite a meditative experience that combines visual intensity, narrative depth, and attention to human nature.

The Torn First Pages (2004–2008) addresses the struggle for democracy in Burma through archival materials, texts, and images projected onto sheets of paper, evoking the protest gesture of the bookseller Ko Than Htay, who tore out pages mandated by the dictatorship. Immersed in darkness, the artist’s most recent work, The Peacock’s Graveyard (2023), part of the Pinault Collection, is a meditation on death and impermanence: seven invisible screens, texts, and abstract images intertwine with a raga (a form of Indian classical music based on improvisation), giving rise to metaphysical fables about power and life.

Curated by Jean-Marie Gallais, the exhibition draws connections between the two installations, revealing formal and conceptual affinities, and offers a timeless, profound meditation on justice, memory, and the contradictions of the present.