LUCA FRESCHI t he p ract i c e of the imper f ect
LUCA FRESCHI the practi c e o f t h e im pe r f e c t
Edited by
Davide Caroli Felice Nittolo
Comune di Ravenna
Provincia di Ravenna
LUCA FRESCHI THE PRACTICE OF THE IMPERFECT There’s no life that couldn’t be immortal if only for a moment... Wislawa Szymborska1 The work of Luca Freschi, with no doubt, always leaves an impression on whoever sees it. His pieces are so dense and intense that no-one can overlook them; they are wrapped in such a feeling of disquiet that, at first sight, they take the viewer completely by surprise, and yet, they contain a familiarity which prompts us to further investigate them. If we consider his entire body of work, starting from the beginning, we can trace a clear line: his love and relationship with the earth (still unbaked) have become the revealing place of an idea, unveiling itself with gentle and unexpected passion. I also have the feeling I know where his most recent work is going, it has taken directions, which are both consistent and complementary with one another, and where the focus of attention is the human figure. The human figure has always been, right from the start, the fulcrum of his work, beginning with his first real size molds, Freschi has always been attracted by the idea of confronting himself with a representation of a You, of the other-than-self, with whom undertake a relationship that would 1 W. Szymborska, Sulla morte senza esagerare, in P. Marchesani, La gioia di scrivere. Tutte le poesie (1915-2009), Aldephi, Milano 2009
unveil the creative processes. As such, terracotta is, and has always been, his favorite media to play and experiment with, may it be for how natural its final effect is, or the liveliness that transpires from it, or for those lines and fractures coming through to the surface and becoming protagonists; emblematic wounds and scars of a daily struggle fought by each human being in order to reaffirm itself. And, in fact, not all those lines are chosen and planned in advance, but it is rather nature, in the end, that has the final say, it is that exact earth that gives the final shape to the bodies. It is the human figure that is, ultimately, the protagonist of this investigation and in a completely different way from what one would expect from a sculptor. His most recent installations, characterized by both a multimedia and an artisan-like dimensions are, bottom line, the reconstruction of a human being through everything that has marked its own existence. These stories are invented, imagined, created from scratch and totally believable for the richness of the outlined and matching details, for that peculiar love for telling the story of a lifetime, starting exactly, maybe, from the least meaningful details, such as all those knick-knacks we are surrounded by, which are supposed to fulfill the feeling of incompleteness we have, when we take ourselves too seriously. We no longer meet a person, but we are faced
with what was its material echo: its memories, the traces it has left behind, which are, them too, a sort of mold and imprint of oneself. In this work Luca manifests an eagerness for what surrounds him, and an obsession totally different from those he employs when making molds, but nonetheless, the final result is that the viewer is left facing a presence, may it be past or present, it does not matter. We can also see in this show, hand in hand with these works, new stunning and graceful pieces called vanitas, a series of white enameled ceramics. A result which enhances and nurtures forms and shapes, almost unwelcoming otherwise, but which become, presented as such, precious and elegant elements. Even his previous work can be interpreted as a celebration of human transience: what was left of those people was exactly there, traces of their absence left behind, but here, these new pieces take inspiration directly from the most classic tradition of symbolism, mediated by Freschi’s sensitivity, who mixes things we are reminded as having belonged to people, with more natural traces, wild remains found in the woods; natural elements that were lost and then found again, which died to be reborn in a different form, symbols of the inevitable decay of things, however destined to a different life. And he does all of this to affirm and testify how nature, inevitably, follows its course, and
brings everything back to its primary state, going through, nonetheless, the transforming and transfiguring artist’s intervention. It is exactly here, that the practice of the imperfect, Luca has wanted to celebrate with the title of this show, echoes: it is not a celebration of imperfection in itself, but the celebration of the intrinsically imperfect form of the nature of things and people; he attempts to make them both beautiful even when they are not, detecting in them the existence of a matrix, which aims to a desire of perfection, a desire they have had since the dawn of time. Thus imperfect, not because it is wrong, but because it is incomplete, missing something that would complete and fulfill it, that would make it whole and take it to its fullest potential. And then there are the crows, a recurrent element that can be seen all through his work, not just classic black crows, but also colorful ones. The crow, which symbolically represents the bird that enables our world to communicate with the afterlife, here also represents a further indication on how the final answer can come from the deepest nature, which draws from the origin of all creations, this is why they are full of color, not harbingers of doom but carriers of a connection with the origin.
Davide Caroli
POST IDEOLOGY 2013 glazed ceramic, wood, pvc, wallpaper, resins, insects, objet trouvĂŠ cm 86x116x18
FORGET YOUR FUTURE 2013 glazed ceramic, wood, pvc, objet trouvè cm 120x124x18
Jesus’ Blood Never Failed Me Yet 2013 glazed ceramic, wood, pvc, object trouvé, sound system “voice” cm 122x125x17
SIMPLIFY AND DISOBEY 2013 glazed ceramic, wood, acrylic paint on paper, cage cm 110x35x19
RUBBLE AND DEBRIS 2015 glazed ceramic, objet trouvĂŠ, scissors and nails cm 36x39x6
BLACK BIRD 2015 glazed ceramic, objet trouvĂŠ cm 35x37x13
ATTEONE 2015 glazed ceramic, objet trouvĂŠ cm 30x57x20
VANITAS 2015 glazed ceramic, objet trouvĂŠ, metal basin cm 40x40x25
www.lucafreschi.com info@lucafreschi.com
Luca Freschi was born in 1982 in Forlimpopoli, a small town in Italy. First graduated from the Art Institute in ForlĂŹ, Decorative Painting and Restoration and then in Painting from the Academy of Fine Arts in Bologna. In these years of activity he has undertaken a research based on the otherness of the human figure, on the personal and collective memory through the use of the casting technique. He has participated in various group and solo exhibitions in Italy and Spain. His work has won awards in national competitions and can be found in both Italian and Spanish public collections. He currently lives and works in the town of Meldola in Italy.
acknowledgements Davide Caroli Felice Nittolo Lara Vitali Paola Babini
Portrait photo:
Frank Hammerbekk Evensen GRAPHIC DESIGN
Lara Vitali Translation:
Angela Lombardi
cover
BLACK BIRD
2015 glazed ceramic, objet trouvĂŠ cm 35x37x13 (detail)
Via Anastagi, 4a-6 48121 Ravenna - Italy (zona Porta Serrata) artgallery@alice.it www.niart.eu Associazione Culturale Divisione Libri 00015