Apparatus 22 _ SEVERAL LAWS. THE ELASTIC TEST

Curated by Eleonora Farina

GALLLERIAPIÙ has the pleasure to announce “SEVERAL LAWS. THE ELASTIC TEST”, the first solo show of Romanian collective Apparatus 22 in Italy.

Exhibited is a series of new works advancing thinking on human body perceived as a battlefield for civilization norms: written and unwritten laws, fossilized values, scientific preconceptions and corporate dreams for consumerism sublime. Apparatus 22 creates seven disturbing pieces of short, poetic texts acting like bridges from which, through a transposition process, new mental images are generated. The series had as starting point a sharp perspective on the body recently brought in by science in CERN, Geneva; the works further explore the lengths one is willing to go and the arsenal available in shaping over and again the bodily surface allotted by nature and look closely at the body cloaked in the artifice, glamour and ideals built by mass-media. Tattooed on leather, the texts stress the contemporary fragility of the human being versus controlling powers – the political and economic one, social and religious, aesthetic and technological – and question the audience’s intimate and emotional facets. The consequences of crossing the canons, the occultation of the prejudices, the empathy for the body in crisis, control and self-expression are all at stake in the new body of work of Apparatus 22.

As semantic appendix and hosted in the underground spaces of GALLLERIAPIÙ, the artists also show the joint work The Hour Broadcast (2014), realized together with studioBASAR + SillyConductor: six radio channels about post war feelings. Intended for the setting of an anti-atomic bunker near Sarajevo, the installation narrates an outside reality of a vaguely-defined historical era through the medium of information par excellence.

#poetrytattooedonleather #bodyasbattlefield #shapingdeepsurface #overandagain #crossingthecanons  #severallaws #fragility #elastictest #empathy #addiction #disturbingmentalimages #apparatus22 #eleonorafarina  #gallleriapiu  #conceptualartonfashion

Thanks to

add – business chance on art and KILOBASE BUCHAREST

MakeInBo

Istituto Romeno di Cultura e Ricerca Umanistica di Venezia

Apparatus 22 is a multidisciplinary art collective initiated by current members Erika Olea, Maria Farcas, Dragos Olea and late artist Ioana Nemes (1979, Bucharest – 2011, NY) in January 2011 in Bucharest, Romania. Apparatus 22 is exploring the intricate relationships between fashion and economy, politics, gender studies, social movements, religion in order to understand the contemporary society. A string of very diverse works – installations, performances, text based – shapes their practice in which reality is mixed with fiction and storytelling and all merges with a critical approach drawing knowledge & experience from design, sociology, literature and economics. The collective participated in exhibitions and festivals at MUMOK, Viena (AT), Museion, Bolzano (IT), Brukenthal Museum Contemporary Art Gallery, Sibiu (RO), MAK, Viena (AT), Steirischer Herbst, Graz (AT), Drodesera Festival, Dro (IT), Young Artists Biennial, Bucharest (RO), Akademie Schloss Solitude, Stuttgart (DE),  Gyeonggi Creation Center (KR), Salonul de Proiecte, Bucharest (RO), TIME MACHINE BIENNIAL OF CONTEMPORARY ART, D-0 ARK UNDERGROUND, Konji (BIH), TRAFO Gallery, Budapest (HU), Future Gallery, Prague (CZ), Oberwelt, Stuttgart (DE), Ujazdowski Castle – Centre for Contemporary Art, Warsaw (PL), Württembergischer Kunstverein Stuttgart (DE), Contemporary Art Museum (MNAC), Bucharest (RO), Galeria Nicodim, Bucharest (RO), Nieuwe Vide, Haarlem (NL), KunstMuseum Linz (AT), Osage Foundation (Hong Kong), etc. The work of the collective was exhibited at La Biennale di Venezia 2013, Romanian Official Representation II – “Reflection Centre for Suspended Histories. An Attempt” exhibition. Apparatus 22 is the winner of the “BIVACCOURBANO_R  RESIDENCY 2015” grant for artistic research and residency offered by Progetto Diogene in Turin.

Exhibition views

Eleonora Farina _ Beneath [three] dichotomous circumstances