LEA – LEAD EXCLUSIVE AREA
NITTO ATP FINALS
Casa del Teatro Ragazzi e Giovani – Torino
Andrea Galvani, Cerith Wyn Evans, Claire Fontaine, Duccio Maria Gambi, Finemateria, Front Design, Luigi Ghirri, Massimo Uberti, Matteo Attruia, Michelangelo Pistoletto, Ra di Martino, Tipstudio.
Curated by Giorgio Galotti and Claudia Pignatale
12–19 November, 2023
Opening reception: Saturday, November 11th, 6.30pm–9.00pm
TIME, a project conceived to open a reflection on humanity and its evolution on planet Earth through the concept of Time and Space. The exhibition path unfolds itself into the areas of LEA – the Hospitality format born to welcome the institutional guests of the Nitto ATP Finals in Turin – at Casa del Teatro Ragazzi e Giovani, a 1930s electrical cabin and now converted in a center for contemporary theater production, that hosts for the occasion the exhibition.
The artworks and design furnitures aims to focus on a theme that has always engaged humanity, with the intention of eliciting in the visitors a cross-reference on how human beings’ on the planet changes in the present time, generating a relationship between reality and fiction through attitudes, places, objects, and interventions that intersect and cooperate with human activity.
Both inside and outside the rooms, photographs, environmental installations, unique artworks and light installations are presented in relation to the architectural structure’s lines, to explore some evolutionary aspects of individuals able to narrate the changing relationship between Time and Space through a comprehensive examination of the surrounding present.
The exhibition path begins outdoor with three impactful light installations, set up on three key points of the facade.
The two site-specific works commissioned for the exhibition: “Unload” (2023) by Matteo Attruia and “Left & Right” (2023) by Claire Fontaine, are both created by the artists with the intention of surprising the observer through a language that has become ingrained in the minds of each of us, derived from the parallel activity of the web. Through the mimicry of icons and emoticons that invade the visual and private sphere of those who daily meet the language of the web – a condensed simulation of reality and reality itself – both artists offers to the observer two messages of strong impact with a conceptual attitude.
In the right corner of the facade, the work “Study on a rotating black hole” (2015-2017) by Andrea Galvani introduces the exhibition path to the indoor areas. This neon installation, made by mouth-blown cobalt blue Murano glass, reports to the visitor a mathematical equation that describes the radical space-time distortions generated by the rotation of supermassive black holes. The neon sign, produced in collaboration with Dr. Eloy Ayon-Beato – a world-renowned theoretical physicist and leading expert in black hole science – transforms the space with its otherworldly brilliance, creating a surprising, cryptic yet emotional impact.
Entering the theater foyer, an environmental intervention by the design studio Finemateria aims to direct the viewer’s focus towards the central point of the room using different materials: from the blue carpet as a uniform background (by Besana Carpet Lab) to the minimal brushed metallic laminate facade and the stucco desk, a typical and recurring material in Italian architecture. Completing the environment are four essential luminous elements inspired by the world of tennis, welcoming the visitor into an ethereal dimension that anticipates the artworks presented in this area.
“Smartphone, Young Woman 6 Movements D” (2018) by Michelangelo Pistoletto, kindly provided by Galleria Giorgio Persano, immerses the observer within the work due to the effect of the mirrored surface, creating a third dimension halfway between reality and fiction, connecting the reflective object to the reflected subject, emphasizing the artist’s exploration of the various dimensions in which the individual exists in their relationship with the everyday.
On the opposite side, four photographs by Luigi Ghirri, generously loaned by Fondazione per l’arte moderna e contemporanea CRT to the GAM – Gallery of Modern and Contemporary Art in Turin, offers a glimpse into humanity’s past through the superb eye of one of the most significant figures in Italian photography, bringing the visitor back to a real dimension, metabolized through interior and exterior views of the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s.
The “Studio di Aldo Rossi” (1989-1990), “Doccia di Pontassieve”, “Casa di Vittorio Savi” (1989), and two from the “Bitonto – Italian Landscape” series (1990), narrate a story suspended between dream and reality, evoking rarefied atmospheres between the past, present, and a future destined to never be exhausted.
In the small Theater, a lounge area welcomes the visitor with Cerith Wyn Evans‘ neon work “In girum imus nocte et consumimur igni” (1999), on which are inscribed the words of a famous Latin palindrome that retains the same meaning when read in both directions: “In the night, we go in circles and we are consumed by fire.” This work, generously loaned by the Fondazione Sandretto Re Rebaudengo in Turin, put the viewer in front of the possibility of circling around it to perceive the symmetry between the linguistic structure of the sentence and the physical movement suggested by its meaning. In conceiving this work, Wyn Evans was inspired by the title of a Guy Debord 1978s movie and the words uttered by the French director’s narrator: “Nothing translates this present with no way out and no rest like the ancient phrase that returns entirely to itself, being built letter by letter like a labyrinth from which one cannot escape, so it perfectly accords form and content to perdition.”
Three photographic works by Ra di Martino from the “No more Stars (Star Wars)” series (2010-2023) are exhibited on the room’s walls. In this series the sense of visual dislocation is rich with suggestions that evoke some topos of 20th century art: fake guard towers, catapults, alien structures; all abandoned set pieces from Star Wars filmed in Morocco, appearing as evocative interventions of Land Art.
Completing the lounge an installation of poufs and sofas called “Pebble Rubble” designed by Swedish designers Sofia Lagerkvist and Anna Lindgren of Front Design for Moroso. These soft stone blocks evoke a sensorial experience. A pleasant illusion that attracts and intrigues altering the perception of time: fast and frenetic in everyday life, slow and inscrutable in nature. “The collection is inspired by forms found in nature. We imagined rocks, moss, and fallen trees as furniture and places where the body can rest. We scanned the rocks we met during our numerous walks in the forest and composed these organic shapes into furniture.” (Front Design).
In “Pebble Rubble” design there’s a clear need to convey a message that transcends the formal and functional qualities of a common seat. The most obvious and immediate aspect plays on the similarity between the upholstered volumes and those of huge stones, smoothed by the relentless action of wind and rain and coated with an organic or vegetal layer that softens their roughness and makes the surfaces welcoming and comfortable.
The setup is completed with “Jeunesse” stools by Duccio Maria Gambi for Secondome + Studio F, generously provided by Galleria Rossana Orlandi. These three works explore the relationship between reclaimed solid wood, with its imperfect and discontinuous material, and compact wood worked with thin thicknesses that act as geometries accentuated by the shades that intrude and interrupt the original volume.
The “Classico scomposto” marble tables by Tipstudio explore the perception of a material as the result of an external and sensorial experience. The relationship between the man and the materials often finds resonance in everyday life, in the traditional idea of it. Classic shapes breaks down, stone is marked with new chromatic relationships, defining a hybrid future and a multifaceted time, generating unusual and identity-driven surfaces that reflect contemporaneity as a continuous contamination and alteration between natural and artificial. The “Stress Limit” sculpture tables by Tipstudio too – whose plaster mold is subjected to the maximum stress until it tears apart – give rise to new scenarios revealed through the aluminum lost wax casting, resulting in the final objects.
Entering in the main Theater room, the environmental neon installation by Massimo Uberti dominates the scene. The artist has conceived a new set up for this occasion using essential elements that perfectly evoke the intervention between dream and reality.
In the author’s work, attention to the spatial dimension of humanity is a constant: chairs, tables, stairs, bookshelves, and architectural elements are transformed into luminous lines, walls marked by luminous perimeters, empty buildings which essence is made of light. Essential forms have the purpose to provoke contemplation of current time.
At the center of the room, a carpet with geometric patterns and vintage atmospheres, designed by Studio Pepe for Besana Carpet Lab from the Grand Hotel collection, serves as a scenography for the restaurant. The room features solid wood tables by Studio F and “Impossible Wood” chairs by Moroso.
Project: FITP – Federazione Italiana Tennis e Padel, with Sport e Salute
Project Manager: Andrea Pivano
Masterplan: Fabio Lattanzi / LastArch
Light Design: Massimo Pascucci
Official Supplier: Moroso