October 9 / November 28, 2020
from an idea by Marco Arosio and with a noted critique by Agata Polizzi
Silvia Celeste Calcagno, Pietro Cascella, Giuseppe Ducrot, Giosetta Fioroni, Loredana Longo, Domenico Mangano & Marieke van Rooy, Emiliano Maggi, Arturo Martini, Marino Mazzacurati, Fausto Melotti, Concetta Modica, Liliana Moro, Midge Wattles
Born from an idea of Marco Arosio, FITTILE desires to be a reflection on ceramic sculpture, aware of the vastness of the artists’ research and the possibilities of the medium’s use. The “material” and its ability for adaptation, for expression, and for creating a relationship with the artist and with the surroundings is what attracts. A medium that can cross time whilst always maintaining its intimate nature.
Contemporaneity has explored the medium combining its functional ability with its plastic and ornamental capacity. It has crossed the wide, open limits to welcome exploration, additions, interactions with other materials, productions and forms, and even new technologies.
The evolution of this research is fascinating. It is as creative as it is philologic, as innovative as it is sensorial and tactile. The results are like a sort of anthology of thoughts and glimpses of time, interpreted not only as a sequence of experiences but also as an ability to wait, a measure of a dimension in which the object – and also the causing subject – is included. This attitude allows the works to be looked at with an understanding of being linked to a unique narrative, which goes beyond the visual aspect and opens up to a sort of intimate connection in which each person recounts themselves – their own vision – made of dynamic, relational, emotive and social spaces.
Works that represent micro stories that are able to emit energy through form, chromatic presence or absence, or plastic articulation. Works that are essential signs of a journey through parts of the soul. Works that experiment and manipulate, that are products of a rebellion, that are answers to the call of design, or a graphic sign. They are pure abstraction or a warning. Finally, they are a material hologram of an introspective analysis.
Silvia Celeste Calcagno, Pietro Cascella, Giuseppe Ducrot, Giosetta Fioroni, Loredana Longo, Domenico Mangano & Marieke van Rooy, Emiliano Maggi, Arturo Martini, Marino Mazzacurati, Fausto Melotti, Concetta Modica, Liliana Moro, and Midge Wattles are the authors of this narrative anthology, authors of “words of clay” that tell the story of the evolution of the ideas and challenges of the artists – far between themselves – or rather joined by the nobility of an artistic production which needs wisdom, patience, delicacy and, more than anything else, a respect for a technique that doesn’t need to make a noise to exist and speak to us.
A conversation with Marco Arosio offers further understanding and completes the overview of the works. He states,
“Of all materials, ceramics accompany the story of humankind the most. Firstly, for functional necessity, then for celebration, and finally for ornamentation. In both simplicity and poverty, ceramics provides an exceptional means of expression. But great competence is needed.
Its strength is in the immediacy of the return and verification. Ceramic sculpture offers infinite figurative images that are often illustrious. For artists it is a malleable, welcoming and complicit medium.
Some of the artists in the exhibition use ceramics in a youthful way, like an “expressive gym”. Others stay faithful to the material offering the possibility of creating small works of incredible beauty, as seen with Arturo Martini. Others, like Fausto Melotti, experiment with the plasticity and versatility thanks to a discussion with Lucio Fontana which introduced him to translate the creative thought through the material. For Giosetta Fioroni the possibility of giving shape to ideas through an excellent artisan understanding is thanks to lucky encounters.
Finally, in contemporaneity – so distracted from the virtual – ceramics is almost “therapeutic” for the artists. It becomes a tangible instrument of expression, combining the desire of the artist with the extreme simplicity of a material that allows itself to be interpreted. The ambiguity of such a poor and sometimes undervalued material becomes instead an extreme strength in its happy relationship with the artist.”
