HERITAGE

OUTDOOR FESTIVAL 2018

Exhibition map (2018) by OrizontaleOutdoor Project

HERITAGE

Being interested in cultural heritage, making it the central theme of a festival that has always focused on the evolution of urban communication codes, was not a predictable operation. Nevertheless, the motto of the European Year of Cultural Heritage was chosen as the starting point for the "Heritage" exhibition: "Our heritage: where the past meets the future".

Cultural heritage is something that we tend to take for granted. We underestimate its fragility because we believe it to be immutable. Actually, cultural heritage is ephemeral by its nature, not just because of the risks associated with the natural passage of time, but also because it is the result of repeated changes of its function, together with the continuous redefinition of what - year after year, decade after decade, generation after generation - is really important in the eyes of a given social group. In fact, what was important for our parents is not necessarily as important for us.

The Heritage exhibition starts from an observation of the evolving languages of tomorrow's urban communication. It’s a platform designed to observe places - be they real or digital - where art take shape and then flows into a labyrinth composed of four paths, each of which represent a peculiar kind of relation to the passage of time: those who stand in discontinuity with the past, those who repossesses the codes of the past declining them in their own way, those who run forward to the future regardless of the past, and those who, instead, includes elements that that are normally left on the margins. Disobedience, Speedlight, Total Recall and Retromania.                         Antonella Di Lullo & Christian Omodeo

Speedlight (2018)Outdoor Project

LIGHTSPEED

Unlike the other section, LIGHTSPEED, wants to represent a different approach to the past, trying to reverberate to it through an impulse towards the future. The artists involved in this path forced the visual perception aiming for a reorganization of the concept of space and time. 

We wanted to show off a glimpse of new aesthetic scenarios, born in this decade, that try to reorganize the present according to new directives, with instantaneous movements untied from the past, to return to the future. A thought on a possible "new" future in an era in which the past has been all - encompassing, as show by the other paths of the exhibition.

Outside in (2018) by UNOOutdoor Project

OUTSIDE IN - UNO 

The five levels that constitute the work of UNO are just like theatrical scenes that follow one after another quickly, defining the external space from the internal space of the exhibition. The succession of fluo colors and geometric shapes, typical of his artistic research, reorganizes space and fruition time of the exhibition. 

Outside in (2018) by UNOOutdoor Project

These stages, which recall the movements of time, from the day to the night, are designed to welcome the viewer and lead him to an immediate and unhesitating choice over the path to be taken inside the exhibition.

UNO portrait (2018) by UNOOutdoor Project

UNO portrait

Labirinto semplice (2018) by MotorefisicoOutdoor Project

LABIRINTO SEMPLICE - MOTOREFISICO

We have no choice in front of our eyes: we just have to take the long corridor without knowing what will be there at the end. Labirinto semplice, created in the long corridor that sarves as the central axis of the pavilion (designed by Studio Orizzontale ) is the work of Motorefisico for Outdoor Festival.

Labirinto semplice (2018) by MotorefisicoOutdoor Project

Geometric shapes that (dis)orient the viewer, directing him to a single road; you will first find yourself immersed and surrounded by walls, and then you will be elevated over the rest of the exhibition, allowing a look from above. A lightning glance towards our heritage, the past, sliding then towards new future scenarios.

Motorefisico portrait (2018) by MotorefisicoOutdoor Project

Motore fisico portrait

Preforma (2018) by Quiet EnsembleOutdoor Project

PREFORMA - QUIET ENSAMBLE 

A zero-form, a timeless form, autonomous, with a life of its own, which appears to the public through dark and heavy cloths, hidden from the rest of the exhibition, as if it wanted to be preserved and shown only to those who share a desire for research towards new horizons, towards a new beginning. The Quiet Ensemble stages a transformation and mutation; we don’t know if it is a primordial form or a new matrix and minimal aesthetic code arisen after a total reset of the past. The spectator is invited to observe this essential, uncontaminated new world – which comes to life right at the end of the different paths of the exhibition related to heritage – as an ethereal presage.

Quiet Ensemble portrait (2018) by Quiet EnsembleOutdoor Project

Quiet ensamble portrait

Disobedience (2018)Outdoor Project

DISOBEDIENCE 

The students and workers revolts in May 1968 are among the most recent examples pf may of relating to the past began to appear at the beginning of 19th century, in the full romantic era. The rebel genius, the misunderstood, the outsiders who does accept compromises: behind these figures hided, in reality, the idea that history should not be linear and that moment of rupture with the past are necessary. The street and the web have always been excellence places for disobedience.

The funeral of Patriarchy (2018) by Wasted RitaOutdoor Project

THE FUNERAL OF PATRIARCHY - WASTED RITA 

The #MeToo feminist movement, which spread virally at the end of 2017 on social media, brought back the role of women in modern society at the center of international debates, giving visibility to a vast number of instances of harassment and sexual violence. Wasted Rita has been interested in women’s rights for years, creating slogans and drawings that she shares on the web. If there is something in our cultural heritage that Wasted Rita prefers not to transmit to future generations, it’s this unjustified imbalance that exists between men and women. 

The funeral of Patriarchy (2018) by Wasted RitaOutdoor Project

The funeral of the Patriarchy is a funeral monument that celebrates the end of the domination of men over women. A wreath of flowers, burning candles and leaflets announcing the premature death of the macho power, together with the faces of powerful men and slogans that praise the end of patriarchy. They represent a hymn to the birth of a modern feminism that will be able to embody the claims of the #MeToo movement.

Wasted Rita portrait (2018) by Wasted RitaOutdoor Project

Wasted Rita portrait

B.toy (2018) by BiancoshockOutdoor Project

B.TOY - BIANCOSHOCK 

Behind the growing success of street art are often mechanisms that transform the artists into an instrument in the hands of galleries, institutions and media. In a market that is interested both in the economy of attention and in the sale of artworks, the street artist is a perfect low-cost toy. He distracts, entertains, sets trends, attracts likes and followers and has no big economic pretensions. 

B.toy (2018) by BiancoshockOutdoor Project

Non serve neanche contattarlo con largo anticipo, perché l’offerta artistica in questo ambiente è oggi così ampia, che si ha un ampio margine di scelta anche a pochi giorni dall’evento.BToy denuncia con l’ironia alla quale Biancoshock ci ha abituati i meccanismi economici alla base del precariato moderno, riproducendo lo starter kit di un perfetto street artist armato di rullo, bomboletta, secchio e asta.

B.toy (2018) by BiancoshockOutdoor Project

B.toy is a self-portrait of an artist who looks in the mirror to remain true to himself, despite the forced homologation that success is imprinting on the street art, reproducing mechanisms similar to those operating in the rap scene.

Stickers Collection (2018) by Mathieu TremblinOutdoor Project

STICKER COLLECTION - MATHIEU TREMBLIN 

During his stay in Rome Mathieu Tremblin was attracted by the stickers. Walking through the streets of the city he became aware of the massive presence of stickers, which he then detached from poles, shutters and walls, before splitting them into three different categories: those with Roman slang, the ubiquitous ones that advertise “Serrande” (shutters) and “Traslochi” (relocations) and those of football fans. 

Stickers Collection (2018) by Mathieu TremblinOutdoor Project

The metallic map, inspired by the Guide psychogéographique de Paris published by Guy Debord in 1957, represents his imaginary drift through the city, free from all the limits that current geolocation apps – like Google Maps or Waze – impose on our urban journeys. Riding a scooter, or walking, he filled his trousers with stickers taken around the city, that he then transposed on the upside-down legs of the totems displayed in the exhibition. In Rome, Mathieu Tremblin also produced a series of stickers with the words “Rome was not burnt in a day”, to remember us that the future has always been born from the ashes of the past.

Mathieu Tremblin portrait (2018) by Mathieu TremblinOutdoor Project

Mathieu Tremblin portrait

We lost in a mask (2018) by Paradox (Painter) x Cpt-Olf (Fotografer) // Berlin KidzOutdoor Project

WE LOST IN A MASK - BERLIN KIDZ 

It is enough to see the Berlin Kidz sliding down with a rope from the roofs of Berlin illegally paint buildings – or to observe the painted masks of their metropolitan tribe, or watch them ride the subway cars while risking their lives – to understand that graffiti are no longer a child’s play as it was in the 80s. Like surfing, snowboarding or mountain biking, graffiti has become an extreme sport practiced for pleasure as much as to feel the adrenaline flowing in the veins. Over time, they have become structured, giving life to an industry that produces cans, streetwear, events. 

We lost in a mask (2018) by Paradox (Painter) x Cpt-Olf (Fotografer) // Berlin KidzOutdoor Project

But the rules of the game have changed little or nothing. Everything is still based on the ability to make one’s name circulate more and more: getting up. For this reason, in a world that is divided between real and digital, between the city and the screens, the Berlin Kidz regularly produce photographs and videos for the web, using the same expressing codes of the extreme sports videos.

Berlin Kidz portrait (2018) by Berlin KidzOutdoor Project

Berlin kidz portrait

At the origins of the New York street art (2018) by Paolo BuggianiOutdoor Project

AT THE ORIGIN OF NEW YORK STREET ART - PAOLO BUGGIANI 

If we were to define Paolo Buggiani with an element it would be, without doubt, fire. His parable begins in Castelfiorentino, near Florence, where he was born in 1933, and continues in New York, where Paolo Buggiani moved in 1962 and where he became an integral part of that movement that began to be called Street Art, as reported in the book published by Allan Schwartzman in 1985. His production of those years, partially displayed in this exhibition, consists of sculptures, performances and photographs, which he exhibits both on the street and in the galleries, alongside other artists he meets and with whom he bonds: Keith Haring , Richard Hambleton, Ken Hiratsuka and Barbara Kruger. Despite the passing of the years his loyalty to disobedience and fire remained immaculate, almost as much as his recurring to mythological figures of Antiquity such as Trojan Horses, sword-wielding Minotaurs or the Icarus speeding in traffic on roller skates.

Paolo Buggiani portrait (2018) by Paolo BuggianiOutdoor Project

Paolo Buggiani portrait

Retromania (2018)Outdoor Project

RETROMANIA 

In an industrial society like ours, that lives of object designed and produced for the masses, it is the concept of vintage that returns an aura to these objects. It includes them in a historical account, normally reserved for those unique and unrepeatable productions intended for the elites. 

Since the 80s, the cultural revolution produced by streetwear has subverted the codes of western clothing: " we will be the first generation to wear trainers up to death" (King ADZ and Wilma Stone, 2017).

Exhibition particular (2018) by Ricky PowellOutdoor Project

NEW YORK PORTRAITS 

It is difficult to understand why in New York it is enough to leave the house with the camera, to be able to make shots destined to become icons of your time. In the world capital of street photography, alongside famous names such as Bruce Davidson, Martha Cooper, Jamel Shabazz or Brina Nobili, 

Exhibition particular (2018) by Ricky PowellOutdoor Project

Ricky Powell's photographs are recognizable for that energy charge and for the unpredictability that has always accompanied the one who is known with the nickname The lazy Hustel.

Exhibition particular (2018) by Ricky PowellOutdoor Project

What most identifies his work, however, is having followed without distinction of any kind both the artists - Warhol, Basquiat, Rammellzee, Haring, Dondi White - and musicians - Beasty Boys, Cypress Hill, Public Enemy-, without this forget that the real stage in New York is the sidewalks where people still create tomorrow's style.

Exhibition particular (2018) by Ricky PowellOutdoor Project

Total recall (2018)Outdoor Project

TOTAL RECALL 

A society capable of benefiting from its past in an immediate ways as ours, had never existed before in human history. The web's continuous process of digital archiving has allowed everyone to have direct and total access to our cultural heritage. In this context, the ways in which the re- elaboration of the heritage has been put in place (and continues to be put) are par excellence tow: nostalgia and irony. 

Total recall takes its name from the 1990 cult film, literally evoking thee recall and the memory and concretizing with this tribute the process of nostalgic and ironic re - appropriation that this section wants to topicalize through the different approaches that artists called upon show towards their historical and cultural heritage. A reference to the past that plays with these two communicative apparatus through a sampling of elements, a mash up of aesthetics, themes, characters and works.

The Past is not Law (2018) by MadameOutdoor Project

THE PAST IS NOT A LAW - MADAME 

Through the investigation of books and engravings from the 19th and early 20th centuries that she hunts and collects patiently, Madame re-elaborates the formal heritage of the past, attributing a new and modern meaning to forms that have survived the passing of time. Moving to Rome she was interested in the representation of the human sense of piety, trying to imagine an atheistic version of an iconography that – in the urban imagination – is almost always imbued with religiosity, leaving behind herself both the vatican statue of Michelangelo and the Pasolini’s portraits of Ernest Pignon-Ernest appeared on the walls of Rome in 2015. Moving in the wake of the thought of the art historian Aby Warburg (1866-1929), Madame focuses on the meaning of visible forms, aiming to understand what they say about the men and women who produce them and venerate them, rather than simply observe how they represent reality.

Madame portrait (2018) by MadameOutdoor Project

Madame portrait

Wilderness (2018) by Scorpion DaggerOutdoor Project

WILDERNESS - SCORPION DAGGER 

Scorpion Dagger, canadian, has become known on the net through his animated gifs in which he inserts characters taken from paintings (often sacred) of the Renaissance (mainly Nordic) making them move to narrate us – and ironically make fun of – our present, 

Wilderness (2018) by Scorpion DaggerOutdoor Project

through the juxtaposition of sacred figures with the dynamics and behavior of our contemporaneity. Ironically grotesque and irreverent, Scorpion dagger vivifies saints, gods and rich people of the past, turning them into (re)animated art.

Wilderness (2018) by Scorpion DaggerOutdoor Project

Chemical Happiness (2018) by Tony CheungOutdoor Project

CHEMICAL HAPPINES - TONY CHEUNG 

Through his drawings this artist gives voice to his thought, becoming a reflective eye on today’s China, a vast country that in the past two decades has almost lost its cultural heritage in favor of a violent industrialization. Not defining himself as an agent of change but just a curious observer, 

Chemical Happiness (2018) by Tony CheungOutdoor Project

Cheung, through the rediscovery of the traditional Chinese illustration, as well as the Japanese manga and Pop Art – along with other elements more related to his imaginary source – makes his work extremely ironic and symbolic. A research on the contemporary themes of sexuality, alienation and violence produced by the profound transformations derived from the turbocapitalist turn of his nation.

Chemical Happiness (2018) by Tony CheungOutdoor Project

“Chemical Happiness represents my doubt, my disquietude and my caution towards this society, where everyone smile, have fun and make-believe, while keeping silent and blinded. It seems that no one notices how much this happiness is false and harmful, or maybe people just pretend not to notice it”.

Almost Ready (2018) by Rub KandyOutdoor Project

ALMOST READY - RUB KANDY 

Participating in two of the four paths of the exhibition (Total recall and Disobedience), Rub Kandy offers us the construction of a new city starting from scrap elements left by a centuries-old city.

Almost Ready (2018) by Rub KandyOutdoor Project

A work that never reiterate itself and shows similarity to the place where it was created. While the recycled polystyrene wrappers taken from the city are the basic module from which the artist started, the concrete is the element that gives shape to the work. The result is monolithic, orderly and apparently unalterable. Its form is the result of what has been given back and then found. In another place and time this may well be different.

Rub Kandy portrait (2018) by Rub KandyOutdoor Project

Rub Kandy portrait

Agit - prop (2018) by Leonardo CrudiOutdoor Project

AGIT - PROP - LEONARDO CRUDI 

The work of Leonardo Crudi speaks to us through a nostalgic aesthetic of the past, inextricably linking society, as an organized and stratified institution, to the man and to the work he has done to create his own patrimony. 

Agit - prop (2018) by Leonardo CrudiOutdoor Project

The concept of heritage and humanity are inseparable, and are the origin of any cultural, architectural or linguistic product. In the works presented here, the style from the Russian propaganda illustrations of the 1900s is used,

Agit - prop (2018) by Leonardo CrudiOutdoor Project

and the portraits of Rodchenko, Majakovskij, ?jzenštejn – together with the words “love”, “propaganda”, “labor-worker” and “machinery” – appear inside. The presence of some of the most important constructivist Russian artists wants to communicate the will, proper to that movement,

Agit - prop (2018) by Leonardo CrudiOutdoor Project

of bringing art back to being a factor of change in society – and therefore of heritage – and not just a self-referential mirror. People, products and actions are necessary for the construction of society and therefore of heritage

Leonardo Crudi portrait (2018) by Leonardo CrudiOutdoor Project

Leonardo Crudi portrait

Classic Dance (2018) by Sam 3Outdoor Project

CLASSIC DANCE - SAM 3

Classic dance is a stop motion video that juxtapose a classic 90’s dance music track and a succession of pictures of classical statues, simulating a choreographic television ballet. The function, as well as the original sacral and rhetorical aura, is lost, and through the movement the statues are being rendered in a fun and ironic way. The sampling of statues ranges between ancient and modern classicism: mythological figures, ancient divinities, olympic athletes, caryatids, noblewomen, renaissance putti and nineteenth-century characters chosen only for their posture or position as a function of this choreographic ballet that celebrates (or criticizes) the emptiness of our time.

Here we are/ Hereditas (2018) by Kid AcneOutdoor Project

HERE WE ARE/ HEREDITAS - KID ACNE 

With “Here we are” the English artist Kid Acne confronts us with an observation that becomes an invitation. The space dedicated to him was conceived as an hypothetical square where the spectator meets other people, opening a dialogue. Here we are, urges the artist, is an invitation to dialogue and to reason on the concept of heritage, a concept that belongs to us as a community. 

Here we are/ Hereditas (2018) by Kid AcneOutdoor Project

Below the surface of this evanescent invitation, the writing in English suddenly turns into a message that comes from the past: “HEREDITAS”. We do not know whether it is the present, through the inscription “HERE WE ARE”, that has erased it, or if it is strongly re-emerging as if to communicate the dual nature, ephemeral and eternal, of our heritage.

Here we are/ Hereditas (2018) by Kid AcneOutdoor Project

At the margins of the great inscription are two warrioress, modern gladiators symbolically placed in defense of the work and the spectator.

Kid Acne portrait (2018) by Kid AcneOutdoor Project

Kid Acne portrait

Credits: Story

Director – Francesco Dobrovich
Executive Director – Alessandro Omodeo

Art Curator – Antonella Di Lullo - Christian Omodeo
Exhibit design - Studio Orizzontale
Visual Artists Assistant – Chiara Piccone

Production Assistant – Chiara Piperni
Production Assistant – Leonardo Dragovic

Stage Manager – Alfredo Sebastiano

Creative Direction – Marine Leriche

Comunication Manager – Caterina Francesca Giordano
Social Media Manager – Alessandro Proietti

Administration - Valentina Sauro

Press Office Manager – Antonella Bartoli
Photografers – Alberto Blasetti

Credits: All media
The story featured may in some cases have been created by an independent third party and may not always represent the views of the institutions, listed below, who have supplied the content.

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