exhibition views at Rita Urso artopiagallery, Milan
October 25 - November 23, 2018
Photos by Riccardo Pasciucco
A multi-voiced dialogue between artworks of different formal natures. In the last few years, Francesco Bertocco, Alessandro Laita and Chiaralice Rizzi, Mirko Smerdel and Marco Strappato have traveled parallel but close trajectories, which have sometimes crossed their paths in academic terms. Sharing the same geographical and generational context, they have developed a bond that has not resulted in explicit similarities in practice, but - perhaps more importantly - has drawn a ‘Disegno Interno’, a common thread that has accompanied them over time. An affective and personal closeness, but also creative sensitivity and methodological attitude that surfaces here and there in the approach to similar issues, even if belonging to different imaginaries.
Each artwork in the exhibition translates the artist’s identity, highlighting the points of contact and comparison with the others: Francesco Bertocco presents one of his most recent video installations, ‘Affective Sciences (2017)’ - a survey on human emotions conducted through the narration of the research place in which they are scientifically studied; Alessandro Laita and Chiaralice Rizzi propose ‘A Study in Solitude’ (2018) ‘, a selection of unpublished photographic prints taken from a film shot in super8 - the result of their interest in the evocative capacity of images and a reflection on the photographic medium influenced by other practices, such as drawing or writing: in this case, the film refers to the impressions collected during a stay in Switzerland in 2012. Even with different outcomes, Mirko Smerdel also works on the concept of catalogue and archive, with the installation ‘Religion’ (2018): two monochrome drawings with a see-through of credit card impressions, and some big folders full of small contemporary traces tell the artist’s research on the signs of neo-liberalism. The ‘collector’ iconography is partly shared by Marco Strappato, who stages in the gallery operating spaces a series of sculptures created in 2016: monochromatic reproductions of office elements - a sort of extra-temporal reification of what we mean by ‘file’ - but also empty documents, pages, sheets.
Francesco Bertocco
Francesco Bertocco (Milan, 1983. Lives and works in Milan). In 2009, he obtained a BA in Modern Literature. Artist and filmmaker, his research focuses on the linguistic complexity of the documentary genre. Recently, he has been dealing with the relationship between documentary and scientific imagination.
Alessandro Laita and Chiaralice Rizzi
Alessandro Laita and Chiaralice Rizzi (Verona, 1979; Como, 1982. Live and work in Milan and Venice). They graduated in Visual Arts at the IUAV of Venice in 2009. Their artistic practice, carried out as a duo or individually, is structured around the relationships existing between landscape, image, memory and their representation, investigating the possibilities of the relationship with objects.
Mirko Smerdel
Mirko Smerdel (Prato, 1978. Lives and works in Milan). He attended the Biennium of Visual Arts and Curatorial Studies at NABA - New Academy of Fine Arts in Milan. From 2010 to 2013 he was assistant professor of the Sculpture course in the Visual Arts department at NABA, Milan. Since 2013 he has been co-founder of Discipula (www.discipula.com), a collaborative research platform that deals with research on the contemporary image and visual culture. Since 2018 he has worked as a painting techniques and artistic anatomy teacher at NABA, Milan.
Marco Strappato
Marco Strappato (Porto San Giorgio, 1982. Lives and works in Milan). His work is engaged in a urgent reconsideration of image production and distribution in contemporary times. His most recent works look at landscape and technology, the screen and infinite space that technology offers us; these issues lead him to question himself about those aspects that we could define as ‘technological sublime’.