11 May 2012 to 16 July 2012
martedì-sabato 11.00-13.00 15.00-19.00
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prometeogallery di Ida Pisani
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Anibal Lopez (A-1 53167) ANTOLOGIA DE LA VIOLENCIA EN GUATEMALA prometeogallery di Ida Pisani
Anibal Lopez (A-1 53167) ANTOLOGIA DE LA VIOLENCIA EN GUATEMALA
Opening / May 10th 2012 / 6.30 p.m. May 11st – July 16th 2012 / mon-fri / 11 a.m. – 7 p.m. prometeogallery di Ida Pisani / Via G. Ventura 3 / 20134 Milan
Prometeogallery is pleased to present a solo exhibition of works by Aníbal López (A-1 53167), reaffirming the long partnership between the gallery and the artist. This exhibition gives Aníbal López an opportunity to examine the situation in Guatemala, his homeland, with the greatest attention, mainly using sculpture as his artistic medium
The starting point for the artist’s anthropological considerations is his awareness that when modern man replaced religious beliefs with legal principles and farming property with profit as a symbol of power, industry took the place of military resources and the functions of art were profoundly transformed. While the work of art originally aimed to preserve collective ideals, protecting them from criticism, with the passing of time art gradually lost its moral and educational function and retained only that of criticism. In so far as it is a means of production, technique has maintained its subjective value as ornament and as an expression of individuality, ultimately transforming itself into monetary value. This does not mean that artistic representation, whether graphic or audiovisual, has stopped interpreting collective ideals but simply that, once this function has been met, the work of art loses its place in the category of “art” and can be referred to solely as propaganda, advertising or as an instrument to convey an “other” message. Even so, when seen from a Latin-American perspective, this aspect cannot be systematised that easily, for agricultural land has never been completely replaced by industry and economic power has always been intrinsically linked to the power of the military. As a result, art from Latin America has been considered closer to ornamental handiwork than to an instrument of social criticism, at times even being seen as kitsch: the more it attempts to be contemporary, the more it is viewed as something like an advertising spot. In view of this, the artist – who wishes to maintain a function that has value for society – has been forced to pose the question by starting out from the very origins of our modern age, or even earlier, from the areas of psychology and anthropology: is the distance between production and consumption really all that necessary? Does market diversification really lead to some sort of satisfaction? Aníbal López attempts to solve this problem by showing a sort of traditional craftsmanship that, in all its crudeness, illustrates the daily death of the people of Guatemala, a country where human beings are often violated as a category, as are human rights, by a state apparatus that is a coercive institution based on the administration of violence. The artist thus recalls the importance of the way in which every nation-state recognises the fundamental rights of its citizens, or fails to do so.
Aníbal López (A1-53167), was born in 1964 in Guatemala, where he currently lives and works. He presented a solo exhibition at the Centro Cultural de España in Guatemala City (2011) and has put on numerous performances over the years. Group exhibitions at the international level include the Bienal de Pontevedra (2010), the biennale in Porto Allegre (2007), the Prague Biennale (2003) and the Venice Biennale (2001), where he was awarded the Golden Lion as Best Young Artist. In June 2012 he will be among the artists selected for dOCUMENTA (13), Kassel.
Giuseppe Stampone Global Education curated by Giacinto di Pietrantonio
Opening / May 19th, 2012 / 6.30 p.m. May 21st – July 31st, 2012 / mon-fri / 4 p.m. – 7 p.m. by appointment prometeogallery di Ida Pisani / Ex Chiesa San Matteo, Piazza San Matteo 3, 55100 Lucca
Prometeogallery is pleased to present a new solo exhibition of works by Giuseppe Stampone in the bewitching setting of the Ex Chiesa San Matteo in Lucca. The exhibition focuses on the Global Education project, the original concept of which dates from 2001, a watershed year when the artist became aware of the fact that, at least at the level of public opinion, until then the centre had been the West, from that moment on the world became dramatically and instantly global. Since then, every action causes a counter-reaction at what is indeed a global level. In particular, the distinctive feature of this exhibition is an underlying thread which reveals the shift from the spoken to the written word through to an interactive experience. From Gutenberg’s invention onwards, the concept of education was based on the fact that every word corresponded to a letter and that in turn, it referred to an image, and the shift from the spoken to the written word took place by means of an alphabet primer. Stampone’s reflections start out from the consideration that this form of education intrinsically requires a coercive type of policy, and thus an education that is imposed from above, West-centric and divorced from the world of experience. Global Education, on the contrary, is based on the experience of each human being. Significantly, the artist draws on immediately recognisable popular images, to which he contributes new meaning. Reassuring symbols and omnipresent icons of the most popular imagination, which satisfy the expectations of the standard consumer, are revisited from a critical and ironic point of view, thus destabilising the viewer’s perspective. From the manual skills of the Renaissance to a neo-dimensional, interactive mentality, Stampone’s aim is to highlight this shift in the mentality of man and in the shift of power from being at the centre of the community to the centre of a connectivity that is digital but also experiential and emotional. Specifically, the exhibition includes 24 oil paintings which portray the most infamous dictators in the history of mankind and 24 red and blue ballpoint-pen drawings that draw on the symbols and forms of communication that in various ways concern them. These drawings, which reveal the imagery of period magazines, thus form a sort of historical archive. The exhibition also includes a panel on which thousands of postcards are made available to the public, with images of the various alphabet primers the artist has created over the years, such as “Yes, we can”, “Bye Bye Ai Weiwei”, “Hasta la victoria siempre”, “Greetings from New Orleans”. Lastly, there will be an interactive map of the world with digital tags, which is the outcome of a series of different emotional experiences. Importantly, the exhibition will also provide an opportunity for teaching workshops on Global Education, involving a number of schools in Lucca, during which the kids will make letters to map out an atlas of emotions.
Giuseppe Stampone (Cluses, France, 1973) lives and works in Teramo and New York. His works have been shown in prestigious museums such as MACRO (Museo d’Arte Contemporanea Roma) and GAMeC (Galleria d’Arte Moderna e Contemporanea) in Bergamo. He won the 2011 Maretti Prize and his work was shown at the Havana Biennial in Cuba. He partecipated in Gwangiu Biennial (2012) and Liverpool Biennial (2010). For some years now he has been working on the “Solsitizio” project, funded by the European Union, in collaboration with institutions, associations, NGOs, artists, curators, critics, and other professionals.
