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l’aperitivo No.68/15
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> Mac Conner Illustration for “Where’s Mary Smith?” in Good Housekeeping, June 1950, Gouache and gesso on masonite, © Mac Conner. Courtesy of the artist
Giudecca 10 30133 Venezia, Italy Tel: +39 041 240 801 www.hotelcipriani.com
No. 68
L’Aperitivo
Rex Gold_Without Boundaries
Illustrato
contents visual
ART
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PHOTO
“Science may set limits to knowledge, but should not set limits to imagination.” (Bertrand Russell) 12 Portfolio Sandy Skoglund
40 Zanotto: technological research interview | by Eric Mc Grath
21 Ich bin ein new yorker exhibit | by Roberto Palumbo
42 Discourse on the method about | by Giacomo Croci
22 Pawel Żak interview | by Brian Midnight
43 Pompeii: what remains about | by Marco Vincenzi
24 My journey: São Paulo collection | by Serena Berselli
44 The Golden Age of Photography about | by Marco Vincenzi
28 Boundaries or no boundaries? about photography and law | by Cristina Manasse, lawyer
46 The tangible immanence of the void: the borderless interview | by Debora Ricciardi
30 In praise of remoteness: a foray amongst the collages of Eugenia Loli interview | by Gaia Conti
52 One interview to Alessandra Bello interview | by Nicola Bustreo
34 Andrea Morucchio. Intacts thoughts interview | by Laura Cornejo Brugués
54 Portfolio Fabio Zonta
39 Services to art: the rental about | by Adele Rossi
>30
>86
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No. 68
L’Aperitivo
Rex Gold_Without Boundaries
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69 Imperiale Signature arts&crafts | by Michael Sägerbrecht
83 God and Gold profile | by Alessandro Di Caro
70 Baselworld 2015 arts&crafts | by Luca Magnanelli Weitensfelder
84 At the Edge of the universe interview | by Franca Severini
71 Wearing a butterfly arts&crafts | by Michael Sägerbrecht
86 The Secession building in Vienna profile | by Alessandro Antonioni
73 Enlightening time arts&crafts | by Michael Sägerbrecht
89 Art courses in the Emirates profile | by Giacomo Belloni
74 The v&a museum: the exhibition of dressed-in-white arts&crafts | by Laura Migliano
90 Space tourism profile | by Benedetta Alessi
76 Maison & Objet 2015 arts&crafts | by Luca Magnanelli Weitensfelder
94 Prima materia. James Lee Byars profile | by Stefania Dottori
78 An unusual workshop arts&crafts | by Laura Migliano
95 The Agenda, must-see art shows by Stefania Dottori
80 I was born with a gift profile | by Luca Maruffa
96 Mad men walking: from advertising to art cover story | by Roberto Palumbo
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l’aperitivo illvstrato -
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> Mac Conner Illustration for “Where’s Mary Smith?” in Good Housekeeping, June 1950, Gouache and gesso on masonite, © Mac Conner
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No. 68
L’Aperitivo
Rex Gold_Without Boundaries
Illustrato
REx Gold
- without boundaries -
M
any people think, and write, that the transformation of lead into gold was the goal of Alchemy. This, like many other things, is, of course, nonsense. This ancient esoteric philosophy actually pursued the desire to transcend the limits of human knowledge and achieve a state of omniscience, to be able, among other things, to cure all ills and live forever. Of course the manipulation of matter and the transmutation of various substances, including metals, were also at the centre of alchemistic practices. Alchemy has spanned millennia and continents, bringing with it a wealth of knowledge from which all the greatest scientists have drawn freely. This is how modern science like physics and chemistry were born. Today we readily accept that a gold ingot is composed of the same sub-atomic particles that constitute our flesh, however, we do not question the meaning of this and we don’t bother to go beyond our cognitive barriers. Somehow we are trapped in a cage of preconceptions and inhibitions and, at some point in our social evolution, we lost the ability to question ourselves, to go beyond. We take everything for granted, as defined. We believe, poor fools, that there are no more barriers. Just as Alchemy, art wants to cross the confines of human intellect, in an attempt to reach absolute perfection. And, like the alchemists, artists work and manipulate raw material to create something different, capable of elevating our knowledge. The goldsmith who works with metals, the photographer that closes himself in the darkroom with his chemicals, the sculptor who tries to free the forms trapped in the material: they are all seeking to break through barriers, the limits, to go beyond, into the unknown. L’Aperitivo Illustrato also attempts to overcome some obstacles, following inspiration, attempting to learn from art, knowing full well that the quest is endless.
M
olti pensano, e scrivono, che la trasformazione del piombo in oro sia stata la meta dell’Alchimia. Questa, come molte altre cose, è, naturalmente, una sciocchezza. Questa antica filosofia esoterica rincorreva in realtà il desiderio di trascendere i limiti della conoscenza umana e raggiungere uno stato di omniscenza per essere in grado, tra le altre cose, di curare tutti i mali e vivere in eterno. Di certo anche la manipolazione della materia e la trasmutazione di varie sostanze, tra cui i metalli, erano al centro delle pratiche alchemiche. L’Alchimia ha attraversato i millenni ed i continenti, portando con sé un enorme bagaglio di conoscenza al quale tutti i più grandi scienziati hanno attinto a piene mani. Ecco come sono nate scienze moderne come fisica e chimica. Oggi accettiamo senza problemi che un lingotto d’oro sia composto dalle stesse particelle sub-atomiche che compongono la nostra carne, però non ci interroghiamo sul significato di questo e non ci preoccupiamo di andare oltre le nostre barriere conoscitive. Siamo in qualche modo imprigionati in una gabbia di preconcetti e inibizioni ed abbiamo perso, in qualche punto della nostra evoluzione sociale, la capacità di interrogarci, di spingerci oltre. Diamo tutto per scontato, per definito. Crediamo, poveri stolti, di non avere più barriere. Proprio come l’Alchimia, l’arte tende a voler varcare i confini dell’intelletto umano, nel tentativo di raggiungere la perfezione assoluta. E, come gli alchimisti, anche gli artisti lavorano e manipolano la materia per creare qualcosa di diverso, in grado di elevare la nostra conoscenza. L’orefice che lavora i metalli, il fotografo che si chiude in camera oscura con i suoi acidi, lo scultore che cerca di liberare le forme intrappolate nella materia: tutti cercano di oltrepassare le barriere, i limiti, per andare oltre, verso l’ignoto. Anche L’Aperitivo Illustrato tenta di valicare alcuni ostacoli, seguendo l’ispirazione, per tentare di imparare dall’arte, ben sapendo che il percorso è senza fine.
editor’s
letter
|
by
Christina
Magnanelli
weitensfelder
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SANDY skoglund
Sandy Skoglund (Quincy - USA, September 11, 1946) is an artist, photographer and installation artist who lives and works in New York (USA). Sandy Skoglund creates surrealist images by building elaborate sets or tableaux, through the use of carefully selected coloured objects and in a process that can take several months. Once the scenery is completed, Sandy Skoglund takes photographs of the finished set while actors enact a performance. Sandy Skoglund studied art history at Smith College in Northampton, Massachusetts, where she graduated in 1968. In 1967, she also studied art history at the Sorbonne and at the École du Louvre in Paris, France. After graduating from Smith College, she attended the University of Iowa in 1969, where she studied film, media art and engraving. In 1971 she received her Master of Arts and in 1972 a Master of Arts in Fine Art, painting. In 1972, Skoglund began working as a conceptual artist in New York (USA). In 1978, she produced a series of still lives with food as a dominant theme (Still Life). One of her best-known works is Radioactive Cats (1980), a monochrome grey room inhabited by two immobile elderly people and a large amount of green cats. Since then Skoglund has been creating environmental installations using everyday objects, small sculptures and materials designed and manufactured by her. She creates surreal and obsessive dimensions dominated by uniform and unreal colours which she then photographs, making them even more chilling by flattening the relationships between light/shadow whilst shooting and exploiting bright colours on the large cibachromes printed on aluminium. She produces about one image per year taking care of every detail. Each installation is built with different techniques and has an autonomous significance, irrespective of the final photo, which nonetheless is an exhibit in its own right representing the artificiality of the contemporary world. Her works are exhibited in numerous museum collections, including the Museum of Contemporary Photography in Chicago (USA), the Museum of Modern Art in San Francisco (USA) and the Dayton Art Institute in Dayton, Ohio (USA). • All images: © Sandy Skoglund, courtesy Paci Contemporary
portfolio curated by CHRISTINA MAGNANELLI WEITENSFELDER
arts and furniture via Prada 12 | 41058 Vignola (MO) Italy jan@8bc.it | www.8bc.it how to contact us: Claire Dejachy mob. +39 335 5478473 clairedejachy@gmail.com
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No. 68
L’Aperitivo
Rex Gold_Without Boundaries
Illustrato
ICH BIN EIN NEW YORKER exhibit
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by
ROBERTO
PALUMBO
Martin Schoeller From left: Cesar Millan with his Dogs, South Central Los Angeles, USA, 2006 Sean Combs Painting, New York, USA, 2010
‘I
ch bin ein New Yorker’ is what, in flawless German, Martin Schoeller could say today paraphrasing the famous phrase by Kennedy. Martin, in fact, was born in Munich (Germany) in 1968 and, after studying photography in Berlin at the renowned Lette-Verein and in Hamburg (Germany), he moved to New York (USA) to work as an assistant to a certain Annie Leibovitz. Four years alongside one of the most important portrait photographers taught him, by his own admission, “the way to understand the most interesting side of the subjects to photograph.” Yet, since 1996, when he began his personal career, Schoeller has been able to develop a very personal technique that would make the style of his portraits unmistakable, taking him to leading magazines such as Time, GQ, Rolling Stone, Vogue, National Geographic and to the ultimate success of being appointed as the photographic editor of The New Yorker: just like another certain gentleman named Richard Avedon who, like him, before him, had revolutionized the way of taking photographs and portraits. The keystone is the series simply called Close-Ups, in which the faces of well-known personalities like Cindy Sherman, Marc Jacobs, Emma Watson, Mark Zuckerberg and others, are all portrayed using the same technique: Schoeller measures the height of the subject’s eye and arranges the lens of his camera at the same level. Instead of a flash, he uses soft neon lights, which contribute to the characteristic cat-eye effect in his portraits. The series (1998-2005) became a show, his first personal exhibition held at the CWC Gallery in Berlin. After almost ten years Schoeller now a New Yorker by adoption, having travelled the world and been on the covers of the most illustrious magazines, is back again in Berlin in the same gallery with Portraits. The exhibition with more than 60 images presents a special part of the artist’s previously unpublished works. Actors, politicians, athletes, artists and musicians such as George Clooney, Jeff Koons, Robert De Niro, Iggy Pop, Hillary Clinton, Christoph Waltz, Meryl Streep and Michael Douglas are portrayed without compromising their humanity. Up to this point. Tony Hawk with a skateboard on the counter in his kitchen, Steve Carell’s face covered with tape or the wonderful face of Cate Blanchett presented in black
and white: direct and real. The vividly coloured settings play with the stereotyping and the clichés of celebrity. The richness of detail in the large-scale portraits portrays the normality and accessibility of the protagonists, while the prints in black and white show their beauty and humanity. In this exhibition, viewers are invited to have fun, wonder and reflect. Schoeller’s approach creates a direct and pure understanding of the most intimate aspects of the subject’s personality, displaying a unique world that counterpoisesthe iconographic andthe personal aspects shedding light on celebrity with a new and somewhat exaggerated perspective. Again Martin Schoeller’s works seem to want to upset the traditional interpretation of photography and portraiture giving viewers a new perspective of the protagonists often accompanied by fun and black humour.
“In this exhibition, viewers are invited to have fun, wonder and reflect”
~
Ich bin ein new yorker di Roberto Palumbo “Ich bin ein New Yorker” è ciò che, in un tedesco impeccabile, potrebbe dire oggi Martin Schoeller parafrasando la famosa frase di Kennedy. Martin, infatti, è nato a Monaco (Germania), classe 1968 e, dopo aver studiato fotografia a Berlino presso il rinomato Lette-Verein e ad Amburgo (Germania), si trasferisce a New York (USA) per lavorare come assistente di una certa Annie Leibovitz. Quattro anni al fianco di una delle più importanti ritrattiste da cui apprende, per sua stessa ammissione, “il modo per imparare a capire il lato più interessante dei soggetti da fotografare”. Eppure, a partire dal 1996, anno in cui inizia la sua personale carriera, Shoeller riesce a sviluppare una personalissima tecnica che renderà inconfondibile lo stile dei suoi ritratti, portandolo su riviste come Time, GQ, Rolling Stone, Vogue, National Geographic ed al successo sublimato con l’ingag-
gio come fotografo editorialista del The New Yorker: proprio come un altro certo signore chiamato Richard Avedon che, come lui, prima di lui, aveva rivoluzionato il modo di fare fotografie e ritratti. La chiave di volta è la serie semplicemente chiamata Close-Ups, in cui i volti di personaggi ben noti come Cindy Sherman, Marc Jacobs, Emma Watson o Mark Zuckerberg ed altri ancora, vengono ritratti utilizzando sempre la stessa tecnica: Schoeller misura l’altezza dell’occhio del soggetto ed organizza la lente della sua macchina fotografica allo stesso livello. Invece di un flash, utilizza la luce morbida al neon che è anche il motivo per i caratteristici Cat-eye delle persone ritratte. La serie (1998-2005) diventa una mostra, la sua prima personale che si svolge nella Berlino da cui era partito presso la CWC Gallery. A distanza di quasi dieci anni Schoeller ormai newyorkese d’adozione, dopo aver girato il mondo e le copertine delle più affermate riviste, torna ancora una volta a Berlino nella stessa galleria con Portraits. La mostra con più di 60 opere presenta una parte speciale dei lavori dell’artista mai esposti prima. Attori, politici, atleti, artisti e musicisti come George Clooney, Jeff Koons, Robert De Niro, Iggy Pop, Hillary Clinton, Christoph Waltz, Meryl Streep o Michael Douglas ritratti senza pregiudicare la loro umanità. Fino a qui. Tony Hawk con uno skateboard sul bancone della sua cucina, il volto di Steve Carell coperto di nastro adesivo o il volto meraviglioso di Cate Blanchett presentato in bianco e nero: diretto e reale. Le atmosfere messe in scena vividamente colorate, giocano con le caratterizzazioni ed i luoghi comuni delle celebrità. La ricchezza dei dettagli nei ritratti di grandi dimensioni espongono la normalità e l’accessibilità dei protagonisti, mentre le stampe in bianco e nero mostrano la bellezza e l’umanità. In questa mostra gli spettatori sono invitati a divertirsi, a stupirsi e a riflettere. L’approccio di Schoeller crea una diretta e pura comprensione delle personalità più intime dei soggetti, mettendo in scena un mondo unico che contrappone aspetti iconografici e personali che fanno luce sulle celebrità con un nuovo e un po’ esagerato punto di vista. Le opere di Martin Schoeller sembrano voler ancora una volta rovesciare l’interpretazione tradizionale della fotografia e del ritratto di genere dando allo spettatore una nuova prospettiva sui protagonisti spesso intrisa di divertimento e humour nero. • www.camerawork.de
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Rex Gold_Without Boundaries
L’Aperitivo
No. 68
Illustrato
PaweL Ż ak interview
|
by
Brian
Midnight
Paweł Żak, Untitled #5, from the series Sweet Monday and other still life
P
aweł Żak studied social sciences at Warsaw University. He graduated from the Academy of Fine Arts in Poznan (Poland) in 2002. Currently he is working as a photography lecturer. He considers the most important characteristic of his photography to be images that belong to so called staged photography with a symbolic nature. He takes not a lot of pictures, photographing mostly things and situations previously conceived in his imagination. He considers photographs to be objects, not just pictures and that is why he takes great care about how they are presented. He has exhibited in many European countries, his work can be found in museums and many private collections. He is represented by Leica Gallery, Warsaw.
Brian Midnight: «Beyond the single project, what do you seek to express through a photo?» Paweł Żak: «We used to regard photography as a
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tool to describe a particular person, place or event. That is its basic function. In most of my work I use photography in a different way, rather like a painter that takes his picture from the imagination and then works on its visible form. In my case, the
“Sometimes it requires a lot of time and effort; sometimes it’s simple and easy” picture is a symbolic synthesis of experiences and feelings.» «How long does it take you to realize a project?» «In my case there are two separate stages of work.
One is the conceptual stage that is hard to predict, you never know when the idea will come to you; the other more predictable stage is the of building the set, lightning and photographing. Sometimes it requires a lot of time and effort; sometimes it’s simple and easy. I know my answer it is a little unclear, but it reflects nature of my work. To be more clear I may say that the series Sweet Monday and Other Still Life consists of about 45 pictures that I took over the last six years.» «In your work man is not portrayed, but we feel his presence, does art therefore make him visible?» «I hope so. My goal is more or less to describe the world of universal experiences and feelings rather than things. If you can feel it, and build your own story by looking at the compositions, it means that the picture is alive as it should be.»