In the wonderful setting of Villa Libano and accompanied by the evening jam sessions, on the ground floor Massimo Catalani presents the video installation :”There she blows” produced and shown this year at EXPO 2015 by Greenpeace and Ganga Film.
On the first floor, Matteo Sanna displays the neon installation ” Comfortably numb” executed in 2010 and already exhibited at several international exhibitions.
Massimo Catalani is well known to the public for his original research in painting and mixed media with urban and seascape images and for his contribution to Paolo Fanciulli project “La casa dei pesci” (The fish home), the first underwater sculpture park in Italy along the coast of the Uccellina natural reserve.
“There she blows” is a short movie directed by Francesco Cabras and Alberto Molinari which tell the eternal relationship between man and the sea through the poetic world of Catalani and his involvement with ecology, thanks also to the exceptional participation of Enzo Maiorca.
The music by Alberto and Alessandro Molinari, North Sentinel, gives the rhythm to a special day: a savage beach of stunning beauty, the artist placing his empty canvas on the right corner, contemplating the sea; everything is calm and peaceful, waiting for the monster to come out.
The movie, full of references, ends with a focus on the ecological work of art by Catalani: the canvas, which is in fact a wood panel, is painted with sand and lights up itself without electricity, thanks to a photo-luminescent salt mixed in with the painting.
A smaller version of this painting is exhibited on this occasion together with the video.
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WwmuDKGSc1A
GREEN PEACE presenta THERE SHE BLOWS
Regia, soggetto, fotografia e montaggio: Francesco Cabras, Alberto Molinari
Da un’idea di Massimo Catalani Con: Enzo Maiorca, Massimo Catalani, Janique Leuenberger, Paolo Fanciulli, Sandra Galvis e Patrizia Maiorca
Musica: Alberto e Alessandro Molinari
Violino: Marlene Prodigo
Oboe: Fabien Thouand
Pianoforte: Alessandro Molinari
Registrato presso Nuccia, Roma
da Giuseppe Vadalà
La canzone ‘There she blows’ (Francesco G. Raganato) è eseguita dai North SentinelVisual Effect e Color: Francesco Struffi
Regia e fotografia seconda unità: Francesco PrincipiniProdotto da Greenpeace http://innomedelmare.greenpeace.it e Ganga Film
All of the Massimo Catalani articles on barganews can be see here
On the first floor of the villa, is exhibited the work of Matteo Sanna with a strong political and socia impact.
The work is installed in a large room in 30’s style, it has still the original marble floor and golden leaf decorations on doors and windows and frescos on the roof.
The visitor will be surprised upon entering to discover not just something of classical beauty but a small waist height wooden house backlit by a green neons light
“Comfortably numb” is a typical American house, with green walls, white doors and an apparent serene atmosphere, but in the dark it lights up a terrible sentence through its windows: “Death to the people of Lot”.
Matteo Sanna saw it on the wall of an Iraqi town and never forgot it.
The viewer is obliged to bend down on his or her knees to read the full sentence through the windows. Their physical participation completes the intellectual one.
The work by Sanna is always delicate and sensitive and it reveals this time an even stronger courage and honesty.
Diversity is the artist’s favorite subject matter and it here appears as a precious concept to protect against any forms of violence.
In both artists’ works, the apparent calm and perfection hide the monster. They both tell the two sides of the coin.
In Catalani’s sea the monster Moby Dick is redeemed with a beauty and its mythological force; in Sanna’s home, the apparent beauty is synonymous with monstrosity with its dull and weak convictions.
The show will be on display at Villa Libano, during the Eno Jazz Festival,Barga (Lucca) from the 18th to the 29th of August 2015, every evening from 8pm through the night.