Studio G7 gallery in Bologna closes its exhibition season with a group show entitled Chiaroscuro again. Compared to 2019, however, the protagonists have naturally changed – the exhibition collects works by Bill Beckley, Gregorio Botta, Daniela Comani, Franco Guerzoni, Eduard Habicher, Jacopo Mazzonelli and Mariateresa Sartori – but above all it has changed the approach with which this new appointment is faced.

2020 opened with an unexpected situation that forced the whole world – and still continues to do so for the most part – to spend a period of semi-physical immobility. This not only had repercussions on the routine of daily life, but also brought changes in the management of work and social interactions. Chiaroscuro, inaugurated on May 28 and open until September 18, 2020, focuses precisely on this latter aspect, investigating “the role of the image in our new routine”. The reflections that led to the creation of the exhibition start from the changes in human relationships that have occurred since the lockdown period, and from the response of the art world to this situation: if on the one hand, in fact, video calls replaced the contact by with our loved ones and smartworking the work in the original locations, on the other, social networks and virtual technology have made it possible to reduce the gap with art. The display, therefore, was the mediating element between us and the world, the only window from which we can continue to participate in the incessant flow of life.

The group show organized by Studio G7, curated by Leonardo Regano, correlates this aspect, which has characterized our daily life up to now, to the direct fruition of the works, not mediated by any screen. The works of the seven artists involved can in fact be appreciated both through a virtual reality viewer and in the physical space of the gallery, so as to allow the viewer to experience the two modes of use in order to trigger a reflection around the image and to the different ways of experiencing it. This, after all, is Chiaroscuro‘s goal: to highlight how technological progress is becoming an additional weapon in the enhancement of the experience of art, and how, on the other hand, the direct fruition of the works remains fundamental for a better understanding of the same. For their part, the works on display also seem to play with the perception of the viewer: if Daniela Comani and Franco Guerzoni cancel the sacredness of the subject to highlight it – the removals of the first are actually statements, while in Guerzoni antiquity hides behind visible signs of recognition – Bill Beckley and Mariateresa Sartori instead put the context in crisis, extrapolating from it a detail and raising it to a mysterious protagonist of the scene. Finally, to Eduard Habicher and Jacopo Mazzonelli the apparent task of circumscribing the different energies present: the first with its free and sinuous Extension (1991), subject only to the full and empty spaces that it itself determines, the second with its Flags (2018) derived from mathematical laws and the rigor of rhythm.

As stated by the gallery director, Giulia Biafore, the Studio G7 was the first in Bologna to inaugurate an exhibition after the lockdown period: a great act of courage, like the one shown by all the other galleries that slowly returned active with their plans – starting again after the complicated unforeseen events of the last period was not at all obvious. Chiaroscuro tries to do it starting from the changes that have occurred, and which have affected the state of the art in terms of fruitful experience: if virtuality allows to explore new dimensions, perhaps distant from us, as on board a fantastic flying carpet, reality helps to keep our roots firmly rooted, which will always remain essential for a correct focus on the surrounding world.

Antongiulio Vergine

Info:

Chiaroscuro
curated by Leonardo Regano
28 May – 18 September 2020
Studio G7, via Val D’Aposa 4A, Bologna
info@galleriastudiog7
www.galleriastudiog7.it