Hotels don’t typically invite anything remotely controversial, serving instead as sanctuaries and safe havens where guests can forget the outside world. But a growing number of hotels—and hotel groups—are speaking to the intelligence of their guests, and catering to their desire to deepen their understanding of the social, cultural and political nuances of the places they visit.
And many of them are opting to inspire those conversations through art.
“Great art captures you, animates you, questions you. It can be in a positive or negative way, but it moves you some way,” says Lorenzo Fiaschi, director of Galleria Continua which represents a roster of avant-garde artists such as Ai Weiwei, Eva Jospin, Anish Kapoor and Cai Guo-Qiang. Last year, the gallery partnered with luxury hotel group Belmond to launch Mitico—the Italian word for “mythical”—a series of temporary sculpture installations displayed in select Belmond properties around
