Valentina Miorandi (b. 1982, Trento - Italy)
Biography Valentina Miorandi (Trento, 1982) is graduate in Theories and Practices of Theater at the University of Bologna. She has won two fellowships for attending the Master in Direction of Photography at the New York Film Academy (2006) and the Master in Photography at the Escola Superior de Cinema y Audiovisuales de Catalunya (2007). Has been visiting professor at the Universidad Complutense (Madrid and Cuenca) and has directed, since 2007, several multimedia projects held within institutional spaces (Foundation Historical Museum of Trentino, MAG Museum, Kultural Bersntol Institut). She has cooperated with internationally established artists like Rosa Barba, Elisabetta Benassi, Stefania Galegati Shines, Marinella Senatore. One of her documentaries has got the MilanoFilmFestival 2010 award. Recently one of her art works became part of the collection of MART Museum and is now visible in the Magnificent Obsession exhibition. In 2013 she won the Euromobil Prize in Bologna Art Fair. Artist’s Statement Valentina Miorandi is a watchful observer of the socio-political context surrounding her creative activity. This context is reflected in her works by the artist’s peculiar attitude to act as a witness. Individual and collective biases, problems of everyday life, institutional symbols, are obviously understood, or may even be the proper object of the work, though never implying straight statements of either a celebrative or a derogatory kind; indeed, the crucial goal is stressing, with the full strength allowed by the effectiveness of the formal representation, those biases, or problems, or symbols, while leaving to the public an unconditional freedom of reflection and evaluation. In so doing, the artist avoids any manipulation, as well as the risk of being in turn manipulated, without having to renounce the political discourse, i.e. working with flags, constitutions, sub-cultural stereotypes, “ the reckoning with history” - the latter far of being a mere matter of mankind past. By such a formula combining the personal engagement with an irreducible independence, Miorandi imposes on herself, and proposes to her public, the condition – both extremely exigent and unavoidable – for a complex relationship, whose building blocks are realism and utopia, the consciousness of what it is and the tension towards what ought to (or perhaps might) be.
175 HECTARES 2013 Partecipatory art project wheelbarrow, 125 kg of white chalk, 6.300 meters
On 27th January 2013, the participatory project titled 175 hectares has run through the streets of the city of Trento. All the community has traced a line of white chalk that measures 6.3 km and the area included was 175 hectares: the exact surface area of the extermination camp of Birkenau (Auschwitz II, Poland). Through the collective action the people, in turn, have passed each other the wheelbarrow and they’ve drawn a part of the line until the conclusion of entire perimeter. Through the physical experience of walking these distances we could perceive the vastness of Birkenau and translate the abstract quantity that indicates its extension.
175 HECTARES 2013 Partecipatory art project wheelbarrow, 125 kg of white chalk, 6.300 meters
Supported by MART Museum, Contemporary and Modern Art Museum of Rovereto and Trento A.N.P.I National Association of Italian Partisans National Jewish Community Historical Museum of Trentino Italian Labor Unions: CGIL, CISL, UIL University Association UDU
Turning Tables 2013 Raft / work in progress archive Growing dimensions
Reading of Manifesto for the Culture written by Teatro Garibaldi Aperto, August 2013, Palermo
‘Turning Tables’ (2013), a floating platform that takes its form from the engagement process of a group of civils who worked together for the reopening of the Civic Gallery of Trento between 2012 and 2013. The phases of the collective work, as well as the final meeting with the institutions, are listed on the blocks of the platform and documented in the dossier inside the attached waterproof bag. ‘Turning Tables’ is a platform, an archive that requires the addition of cards and stories documenting today’s artivism practices. Current participants: S.a.l.e Docks, Venezia Teatro Valle Occupato, Roma Galleria CIvica, Trento Teatro Coppola, Catania Teatro Garibaldi Aperto, Palermo
Turning Tables 2013 Raft / work in progress archive Growing dimensions
Collective action:“Turning Tables, per fare una zattera ci vogliono arti democratici / Building a raft needs democratic arts�
Some boards of the raft sawed by the community
BREAD 2012 Light sign, legal contract 124 x 33 x 8 cm
BREAD is a cultural project. It’s a light sign that dominates the urban landscape to declare that in that venue they produce a basic and essential element like bread. Essential, like culture should be considered. The work was born from the necessity to underline how culture is an essential good for the community and a fundamental investment for a forward-looking country. All official statistics agree that pouring money into culture and the arts returns a much larger multiple of resources. Art is not a liability, it is an asset, and worthier than many alternative allocations cheered by conventional economics. Accordingly, portraying the basic alimentary good, or rather its significant, points to a whole range of substantial meanings: art is as indispensable and natural as bread, it keeps individual and societies alive, and fosters prosperity through creativity. Paraphrasing Adam Smith, the Wealth of Nations, and their aesthetic and moral rescue, are here. In order to display the light sign it is necessary to sign a legal contract (signed by the person who exhibits it and by the artist) in which the proposals of the project are shared. The light sign, usually perceived as belonging to the language of advertising, is re-contextualized to propose another meaning. The big light sign Bread, hung in cultural production venues, underlines how culture is a primary good that strengthens the individual and the community. In brief the contract states that: - the light sign BREAD can be hung, exclusively in venues and/or by individuals who can demonstrate that their activity is aimed at investment in art, promotion and/or cultural production. - the person who displays the light sign can write the word “bread” with his handwriting. - the person who signs the contract can use (always with the permission of the artist) the writing “Bread” to sign projects/events to culturally strenghten society, thus joining a network of people whose activities are united by the same aims. The project will last until 28th February 2022.
ITALIAN NATIONAL ANTHEM 2011 2010 - 2011 Sound recording on vinyl 33 rpm, 1’ 49’’ Quirinale Collection, Rome
The words of the text of the Italian National Anthem 2011 are drawn exclusively from the text of the Italian Constitution, drafted by the Constitutional Commission in 1947. “The Constitution is not a machine which, once triggered, can move on its own. The Constitution is a piece of paper: if we let it drop, it will not move. If we want it to move, we need to fuel it every day; we need to put our commitment, our spirit, our will to keep these promises, our responsibility into it.” (Piero Calamandrei) Lyrics: Democratica, fondata sul lavoro, indivisibile / Un popolo unito sovrano di pari dignità / Diritto, Stato, Identità / Donne e uomini progetto di nazione / Inviolabile è la Costituzione, strumento di unione e civiltà / Ripudia la guerra è libera. Libera persona, libera espressione, libera di scienza, di pensiero e religione. / Futura, di tutti, volontà, Repubblica, l’Italia.
www.valentinamiorandi.com/inno
LAST 2013 Light box, X-ray film 115 x 60 cm First Prize Euromobil, Bologna Art Fair 2013
On the last x-ray film, made to ascertain the state of conservation of the painting of the Last Supper of Leonardo da Vinci, the only figure that is impressed is that of Christ. If the Eucharistic banquet is the founding ritual of the church gathered around Christ, the empty table reveals the crisis. Perhaps the hope of redemption is still with us, perhaps he continues to proclaim his creed, but no-one pays any attention. If by interpretation we mean the semiotic return to a meaning based on a sign, then in order to reinterpret the work it is necessary to modify the sign. Miorandi does this by subtraction, in a kind of backwards journey through the composition of Leonardo’s work. All that remains is the profile of a single man.
BEAUTIFUL SIGN 2011 Clear, giclèe print on cotton paper 110 x 80 cm MART, Collection Art Unicredit
The shape of the Venus of Milo, the symbol of classic beauty in Western culture, was examined by a plastic surgeon, who outlined the signs provided by new aesthetic models. The comparison of different standards of beauty, which are closely related to the historical period and to the cultural and economic situation of a society, triggers a reflection on how the aesthetic ideal may change over time.
POST ITALY 2011 - 2012 Billboard project 600 x 300 cm each Foundation Galleria Civica Trento
Italy is in sixty-first place in the list of freedom of speech of the press. The majority of the community has not the possibility to access the means of mass communication. The blog “madinitalyproject.com” collects posts, that include data, information, news that people consider necessary to spread. “Post Italy” is a project with the goal of amplifying the diffusion of news that would otherwise remain unknown, acting as a mediator between the community and the media. To date “Post Italy” has been able to spread news through a billboard project in the city of Trento during 2011, in Bozen during 2012 and on the digital tv channel History Lab.
www.madinitalyproject.com
VERGANGENHEITSBEWÄLTIGUNG 2009 Digital print on PVC 280 x 210 cm Courtesy Arte Boccanera, Trento
Mass media allow all societies to transmit information about themselves. As a result of military defeats, major political scandals or radical social changes, new expectations on national and international levels arise, and all incumbent elites need to confront the recent past: freedom does not imply removal, but the raising of individual and collective (in particular, national) consciousness of the moral and historical bases of our existence. Past never runs out, and one sort or the other of “Vergangenheitsbewältigung” (the reckoning with history) is ubiquitous, as stressed by many experiences of Eastern Europe, Central Asia and Africa and South America. All states, societies and cultures develop forms, methods and specific questions for launching the public debate on history.
TOP 20 2010 Site-specific project 20 cards’ library - 12,5 x 7,5 cm each Courtesy Arte Boccanera, Trento
Reproduction of 20 cards’ library of the 20 books most borrowed at the Italian Cultural Institute in Bucharest, Romania, in 2010. The book most read in 2010 was “L’Italiano per gli Affari / Italian Language Business”.
CROSS BROADWAY 2009 video 16:9, color, Pal, stereo, 5’ Courtesy Arte Boccanera, Trento
Video shot in sequence plan. The artist turns herself into an “accidental tourist” grappling with an unusual exploration around Manhattan’s soul. The heart of the city is recorded in one shot, without interruption, the cinematographical structure is like the opening credits of a movie; the 42nd street in its status of symbolical space, brimful of bright lights and neon signs is crossed by anonymous human figures. People transit the crossroads like accidental tides, overlapping each other and become “famous” for the short time of their passage and then fade away, replaced by other momentary “stars” . During this fleeting transit, it’s the artificial genius loci of this non-place to choose and determine the real stars of the show as part of Cross Broadway.
www.valentinamiorandi.com/cross_broadway
ALTER ECO 2009 7’ 14’’, loop X - Initiative, New York (USA) Fabrica de Pensule, Cluj Napoca (RO)
The installation is a four loudspeakers ensemble diffusing the echoes recorded through various sites around of the Region Trentino Alto Adige (Italy). An electronic assistant provides the data (north longitude, latitude, and altitude) which identify the precise source of the sound signal. The recorded track documents the changeability of the sound wave as it meets the obstacle. The sound spreading is perceived as more or less constant according to the territory’s shape.
ONLY YOU 2010 Forex 50 x 180 cm Courtesy Arte Boccanera, Trento
LEAVE ME ALONE 2009 GiclĂŠe print on cotton paper 60 x 40 cm each Courtesy Arte Boccanera, Trento