Torino Italy

Internaturalism

This post comes to you from Cultura21

Collective exhibition, 8 May – 29 September 2013, and international symposium, 8 May, at PAV (Via Giordano Bruno 31, Torino, Italy)

On Tuesday, 7 May 2013, at 6.30 pm, the PAV will open the collective exhibition Internaturalism, curated by Claudio Cravero. The exhibition aims to investigate some of the research and practice of the branch of contemporary art generally known as “ecological art” or “Bioart”, demonstrating the links and connections to current ecological debates. The works of art on show in Internaturalismassume an essential role as vehicles of social understanding of the world around us, and succeed in constructing concrete meaning from often abstract issues related to the environment and ecological drift (from loss of biodiversity to pollution and global warming). Emerging from the works of the sixteen artists in the exhibition are visions and narratives of nature that coincide with the concept of “internaturalism”, namely the capacity to imagine a hybrid between the different meanings of nature, understood not only as the common good of humanity but of all living beings.

The exhibition

Among the works on display is Perpetual Amazonia, an environmental video installation by Lucy + Jorge Orta. Commissioned in 2010 by the Natural History Museum in London, it is the narration through images and prose of an expedition undertaken in the Peruvian rainforest. The study of nature is also explored from an ethological point of view in the work of Henrik Håkansson, through a video-documentary that examines the behaviour of insects and birds. Addressing similar themes are 108, Luana Perilli’s living installation that consists of a domestic scene featuring everyday objects and a colony of ants; Colombaia mobile (Mobile Pigeon Coop) by Filippo Leonardi, a housing structure that connects two spaces through the use of carrier pigeons and, finally, Laurent Le Deuff’s sculpture in the park which is based on the underground tunnels drawn by moles. The relationship between man and nature with regard to the common cellular and organic matrix that combines living beings and the environment is also explored in the exhibition, for example in the interactive installation Bio-acqua by Piero Gilardi or in the biological processes analyzed in a mining cave by Andrea Caretto and Raffaella Spagna. Through Brigitte de Malau’s ritual performance and the work on seeds waste by Norma Jeane, Internaturalism also explores the land and the nutritional habits connected to it. Last but not least, some of the works in the exhibition intend to trigger an awareness of the typical behaviour of the homo consumer, actions aimed at the commodification of nature and of the profits related to so-called bio trade (as in the work New Alliances by CAE|Critical Art Ensemble and in the light installation Shelf-life by Uli Westphal). A series of cultural reflections on the theme of language completes the exhibition. In this regard, the results of the workshop Segni d’incontro (Signs of meeting) conducted by Nja Mahdaoui and Agostino Ferrari are presented, as well as Mixture of Plants by Gabriella Ciancimino. Ciancimino’s work is installed in the courtyard and consists of a sound apparatus through which a conversation between the artist and Christian Berg, scientific head of the Botanical Gardens of Graz, is heard.

As part of the exhibition, the Educational and Training department of the PAV, curated by Orietta Brombin, will host Rerum Naturae, a programme on the role of man in relation to natural phenomena; Cultivating Signs which addresses the issues of exchange and relationships andDelicatessen, or edible matter as an artistic medium. In terms of training for adult audiences, onFriday, 31 May, Saturday 1 June and Sunday 2 June, Andrea Caretto and Raffaella Spagna will lead Workshop_33 / Back and Forward_Colonization_02, a collective and immersive activity based on housing and work as methods to explore a place.

The Symposium

On Wednesday 8 May, from 10 Am to 6 Pm, at the Casa del Teatro Ragazzi, the PAV will host a symposium entitled Internaturalism, dedicated to debates around the theme of nature. The conference will analyse the theme of nature from multiple perspectives (aesthetic, ethical, anthropological and artistic). For more details about the symposium: click here to download the PDF file.

Cultura21 is a transversal, translocal network, constituted of an international level grounded in several Cultura21 organizations around the world.

Cultura21′s international network, launched in April 2007, offers the online and offline platform for exchanges and mutual learning among its members.

The activities of Cultura21 at the international level are coordinated by a team representing the different Cultura21 organizations worldwide, and currently constituted of:

– Sacha Kagan (based in Lüneburg, Germany) and Rana Öztürk (based in Berlin, Germany)
– Oleg Koefoed and Kajsa Paludan (both based in Copenhagen, Denmark)
– Hans Dieleman (based in Mexico-City, Mexico)
– Francesca Cozzolino and David Knaute (both based in Paris, France)

Cultura21 is not only an informal network. Its strength and vitality relies upon the activities of several organizations around the world which are sharing the vision and mission of Cultura21

Go to Cultura21

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Etienne de France – Tales of a Sea Cow

This post comes to you from Cultura21
2012, March 30 to June 24 – Parco Arte Vivente, Torino (Italy)

Curated by Annick Bureaud – Opening: March 29 at 6.30 pm

In a finis terrae like scenery – rarefied, cold and blurring – takes place the story of a scientific team engaged in a field research across the seas of Iceland and Greenland, in order to prove (at least in the form of sound recordings) the survival of some specimens of the “Steller’s Rhytine” – a marine mammal declared extinct. Science or science fiction?

Chronicle of an adventure as well as methodological exercise, the multimedia project by Etienne De France (living in Paris and Reykjavik) blurs reality and fiction, retracing and reshaping the traces of a world both virtual and potential, a plausible Otherwhere, which is mirror and metaphor of the Real.

Opening hours: from Wednesday to Friday, 1 pm – 6 pm ; Saturday and Sunday, 12 am – 19 pm
PAV – Parco Arte Vivente, Via Giordano Bruno 31.

Events:

  • Inner focus: March 28th, 5 pm, Accademia Albertina delle Belle Arti, via Accademia Albertina 6.  Speakers: Etienne de France, Massimo Melotti (ethics of communication) and Maria Teresa Roberto (phenomenology of contemporary arts).
  • Press conference: March 29th, 11 am, PAV – Parco Arte Vivente

Background

Collaborating with paleo-zoologists and biologists, the artist retraces every tiny detail concerning the existence of Steller’s rhytine and reconstructs its world – its habitat, the routes it used to follow, its behavioural patterns – trying to fill the void created by the animal’s extinction. Exploiting the latest scientific methods and techniques, De France imagines and follows a team of experts engaged in checking reports of some unexpected sightings, looking for confirmation, at least in the form of sound recordings, to prove the survival of some specimens of the long-lost Sirenian.

The result is a blend of science and fiction, a return to the atmosphere beloved of Jules Verne, in which elements of the real are interwoven with the dimension of the possible, perhaps with that of dreams.

Within the framework of PAV Educational and Teaching Activities, curated by Orietta Brombin, Tales of a Sea Cow becomes the starting point for the workshop Gulliver’s Travel, dedicated to exploring in depth the theme of otherness through the curious eyes of the traveler of the eighteenth-century literary genre.

In the area of education for young artists and adults in general, on Saturday June 2nd the theme will be taken up again by Piero Gilardi in a public workshop entitled Noi come animali (Us as animals).

Cultura21 is a transversal, translocal network, constituted of an international level grounded in several Cultura21 organizations around the world.

Cultura21′s international network, launched in April 2007, offers the online and offline platform for exchanges and mutual learning among its members.

The activities of Cultura21 at the international level are coordinated by a team representing the different Cultura21 organizations worldwide, and currently constituted of:

– Sacha Kagan (based in Lüneburg, Germany) and Rana Öztürk (based in Berlin, Germany)
– Oleg Koefoed and Kajsa Paludan (both based in Copenhagen, Denmark)
– Hans Dieleman (based in Mexico-City, Mexico)
– Francesca Cozzolino and David Knaute (both based in Paris, France)

Cultura21 is not only an informal network. Its strength and vitality relies upon the activities of several organizations around the world which are sharing the vision and mission of Cultura21

Go to Cultura21