We met Lorenzo Rubini, founder of THEPÒSITO Art Space, an exhibition space and a virtual platform founded in 2023 in Narni. Umbria. The artistic director talks to us about the projects and program of the project space by reflecting on the contemporary artistic situation in Italy.

“I fumi delle giostre” from the exhibition “Catastrofe” by Sasha Toli, photo credit Tanita Gennari, courtesy THEPÒSITO Art Space

Sara Buoso: To being with, would you like to tell us about your background which includes national and international projects, and the reason that made you choose Narni and more broadly Umbria, as the context for THEPÒSITO? How do you balance your interest in enhancing such a culturally stratified territory with the need of reaching a national and international visibility, typical of contemporary art?
Lorenzo Rubini: I graduated in History of Art, Master’s Degree, at La Sapienza, Rome, which followed a series of experiences as assistant curator for MLAC, Museo Laboratorio Arte Contemporanea affiliated with the University, which reopened to the public in 2013, and this allowed me to shift my interest towards curating. After two years in Shanghai, China, I approached the art galleries’ sector with independent collaborations, gaining experience in the curatorial field which I combined with my historical-artistic training, choosing to focus on contemporary art. Back in Italy, I attended a Master’s in management of cultural events where among the lecturers there was also Gabi Scardi, at Catholic University in Milan. This is where I joined Lia Rumma’s Gallery where soon after an internship, I was confirmed for a 360° position. There, I began to cultivate a relationship with artists and collectors as a registrar, fluidly dealing with all the stages of displaying and designing exhibitions in the gallery and fairs. This experience has professionally and profoundly marked my approach as a curator. As artistic director of THEPÒSITO today, I like to say that each exhibition project, from the concept to the display stage, carries with it its specific meaning. After three years in Milan during the pandemic, I returned to Umbria because I wanted to think of something personal. Drawing back from my knowledge and experiences, I thought of first creating a platform and then reusing unused spaces for exhibition projects. Two months later, the opportunity arose to work on parallel projects and to use two disused spaces in the municipality of Narni which are now the offices of THEPÒSITO. I started with instinctive projects, not yet formalized to better understand the direction I wanted to follow. So, why Umbria? Because it is home. I know the place well and my aim is to bring contemporary art here. My practice is about doing and experimenting. I do not deny that sometimes it is complicated to manage such a project, however, without necessarily having to be romantic, here I feel free to approach situations. Regarding the difference between local and global, after the pandemic, I go back to my idea of ​​returning home. In that period, the art system fell apart, and as with other new exhibition spaces, with THEPÒSITO, it is now necessary to return to the dissociated territories of contemporary art, those who are linked to research, hyper-local contexts where the need to speak to the territory is still perceptible. In Umbria, in Narni, there was no contemporary spaces where an artist could feel at ease at the time of the exhibition. I would add that in Italy, I believe, each territory still needs to be admired, and it is therefore necessary to bring to it a new visibility.

Alex Urso, “Painting Clouds”, installation view, photo credit Tanita Gennari, courtesy THEPÒSITO Art Space

How would you define your curatorial approach? In other words, what is the vision of THEPÒSITO and how does this translate with regard to the artists you represent and in your program?
My curatorial practice is initially very instinctive. I proceed from researching about the exhibitions, certainly also online where I recognize it is important to have a presence nowadays. I write a message, I research further, then try to understand if the artist’s work is in line with my research, and finally as a curator I look at the space. I invited mid-career artists like Laura Santamaria for the exhibition orbite sacre corpi celesti in April 2024, with whom we worked on an exhibition that had a purely site-specific layout in a church in the historic center of Narni. It was stimulating to work side by side with Laura while at the same time I was focusing on the exhibition space that I was about to inaugurated. Subsequently, in fact, I have invited artist, Alex Urso for the solo exhibition Painting Clouds, who intervened in the new space of THEPÒSITO with an almost ‘construction site’ setting. This first exhibition became the perfect context for the birth of a project that is now taking shape. In fact, Alex’s work created a new, decontextualized environment, compared to the exhibition space. It’s a shock every time. In fact, I ask each artist to work on the space, to use it in a unique way, and so I intend to maintain the vision of THEPÒSITO. Umbria represents my context and here I aim to alternate the national and international level, calling artists and asking them to work in the territory. I also conduct research on Umbrian artists as well as national artists, and I further think about projects outside the territory. I am interested in contexts that somehow need to be reinterpreted and this part of Umbria is a context that is well associated with others. In fact, the place where THEPÒSITO is located presents itself as industrial site near the industries of the area, but if we want, we can find references in the Middle Ages.

Sasha Toli, “Catastrofe”, installation view, photo credit Tanita Gennari, courtesy THEPÒSITO Art Space

On September 14th the exhibition Catastrofe opened, the first solo exhibition of the Umbrian artist, Sasha Toli. Would you like to tell us about the project and the collaboration with the artist?
Sasha Toli is an artist who carries out research on the territory, an artist who has an approach that starts from pictorial research to further explore installation and sculpture, and who here measures himself for the first time, with incredible site-specific practices, pushed to experiment beyond the limits of his research towards the project-room of THEPÒSITO. Sasha Toli is linked to figuration and specifically to the painting of the 16th and 17th centuries such as Hieronymus Bosch, which he revisits by referring to South American contexts through the representation of figures crushed between the human and the superhuman. Through the reference to psychotic substances such as mushrooms, his installation works here become a medium between reality and figuration and suggest an augmentative metamorphosis that finds its roots in the cults and microcosms as venerated by the Mayan and Aztec populations, of Greece and Mesopotamia, to activate energies drawn from the divine context as for the symbolic figure of the lightning that burns when it falls, but from whose energy, a new life is born. I was captured by his work and by what is the core of his research for which the work does not create content but is itself an experience

Sasha Toli, “Catastrofe”, installation view, courtesy THEPÒSITO Art Space, photo credit Tanita Gennari

The pandemic has undoubtedly marked a watershed in the contemporary art system. What do you think are the most relevant changes in this sense? What is the situation of artists and the art system in Italy? What continuities and what differences?
If we talk about Italy, there is no doubt that we are faced with more difficulties than in England, France, or China which, artistically speaking, would deserve a chapter of its own. This happens because in Italy, a certain stereotype persists regarding the figure of the artist. There are difficulties in being an artist in Italy today, funding is limited, there are often no right connections, and it is difficult to promote oneself. Independent spaces like THEPÒSITO, with their presence, want to try to fill these gaps. There is no culture of artistic collectives in Italy as is instead predominant in the United Kingdom, even if they existed years ago in Italy and now seem to be returning among younger artists. The network of museums and galleries seems distant, and it is perhaps the task of art academies and colleges to push artists into other contexts. Usually, I let the artists intervene in the project freely, and I am always fascinated by the productive power of building exhibitions directly with them: this approach that makes my work as a curator mature. For THEPÒSITO, I think of a neighborhood gallery where the local accent is fundamental by virtue of an approach that is established with the public who in turn associates itself with a particular place. This is the approach we would like to give by also opening up to other artists and international collaborations such as those already established with artists, Lunnawabi, a Mexican artist and with the Spanish, Ines Capella, which have opened us up to external collaborations and that we would like to concretize with artistic residences in the future. Finally, the relationship with the exhibition in the space is important and every exhibition is different. While conceiving each project, the presence, and the support of the artists on site remains fundamental, just as it is essential to assume an online visibility today

Info:

THEPÒSITO
Via del Parco 1, 05035, Narni Scalo (TR) – IT
First floor
Tuesday – Friday, 5 pm – 7 pm and by appointment
theposito.com

Sara Buoso

She is interested in the visual, verbal and textual aspects of the Modern Contemporary Arts. From historical-artistic studies at the Cà Foscari University, Venice, she has specialized in teaching and curatorial practice at the IED, Rome, and Christie’s London. The field of her research activity focuses on the theme of Light from the 1950s to current times, ontologically considering artistic, phenomenological and visual innovation aspects.