RONALDLEWISFACCHINETTICURATORIAL EXPERIENCE PORTFOLIO 2004-2016

Events are experiments. I sometimes create intimate events to test an hypothesis with just a few participants. From these experiments emerge larger models, or small lessons which bloom later on.

Some very small but significant events I conceived at the beginning of my curating career had to do with applying yoga techniques to the experience of art. How can we contemplate art? Can we use art as a meditation tool? What techniques are available to us to reach enlightenment through beauty? Can there be a yoga of art?

CURATING IS EXPERIMENTING

Yoga experiments at the Teatro Sociale di Bergamo above in 2005 in collaboration with the artist collective “Ferrario Freres”. At the Miart in 2004, a guided meditation on a chair sculpture of Chiara Camoni, and at the Palazzo Ducale in Genova in 2008, a focusing experiment on works of an exhibit I curated: “Mechanical Art from Kaohsiung”

BOX SHOCK: THE MAZEUM

The first curatorial format I devised was for Self Storage facilities: transform empty boxes in exhibition spaces connected through a dimly lit labyrith. The self storage units allow for protection and individual isolation. The corridors prepare the viewer to the aesthetic experience.

A very easy to organize, low-cost event. Usually 25-30 installations. The events last for two weeks.

Box Shock Bergamo: 2004Box Shock Milano: 2009Box Shock Forli: 2012

Pictures of Box Shock event in Milano in 2009 with installations by 24 young visual artists.

MILANO, TORINO, JERUSALEM, ROME, CASALE MONFERRATO, VARESE, BERGAMO, GENOVA, TIRANA, VENEZIA, NEW YORK, VANCOUVER, EDMONTON.

I inaugurated ContainerArt in 2004 in Bergamo with the first 21 containers. The last ContainerArt event was in Vancouver in 2013. The originating idea for this curatorial format was to create an intimate experience of art in a public context. The format evolved into a globally franchisable sponsor-supported public art event that brought the latest avant-garde trends to the street. Containers connected far away communities and individuals through art.

The event has been covered by hundreds of on-line and printed pubblications. ContainerArt installations have been seen by millions of people worldwide.

CONTAINERART: THE FIRST NETWORK MUSEUM

ContainerArt interactive installations I curated in Rome and Jerusalem in 2007

SAO PAOLO. BRAZIL 2008EDMONTON. CANADA. 2011VANCOUVER. CANADA. 2009-10-11-12

These are the first experiments of a more articulate vision of temporary/permanent museums built around archetype figures. In collaboration with international institutions, galleries and curators. At its peak in 2011 my temporary museums have been visited by 1.2 million people

CONTAINERART TEMPORARY MUSEUMS

ContainerArt temporary museums. Above Sao Paolo. Below, Vancouver. ContainerArt brand provided to Brazilian and Canadian partners in licensing while working with local curators and artists.

BE IN BLOGS

While a viewer must be undisturbed as he faces a work of art, he also must be allowed to express his catharsis afterward. Hence Be In Blogs.

First experimented during ContainerArt in 2008, these are a suite of applications for mobile kiosks meant to help people express their opinions and interact with one another. I developed this suite with a programmer in Italy and tested it at my events.

Be In blogs were a personal victory in creating an ideal of networked and disseminated museum. Art can connect people, or at least... art criticism.

VROOM: THE MOBILE MUSEUM

An exhibition format for video-art which I devised and introduced in 2008 in Milano, Turin and Venice. The originating idea was to bring content inside a protected environment and deliver it with logistical ease. Cars are equipped with a windshield “Aesthetoscope” which I had produced for MINI cars. You go in and watch the video, protected from the outside bustle. The cars could be reserved online: video-art at your doorstep,

It is easier to pay attention to video content in a Vroom than in a museum. We are naturally more attentive when we sit in front of a steering wheel. In that seat, distraction can cost you your life.

A few examples of Vroom positionings in Milano and Alessandria with a work of Vincenzo Marsiglia inside. In partnership with MINI. 2008

MINDCUBES: PROTECT CONTEMPLATION

I devised the MindCube format in 2009 as an extreme way to protect the viewer as he attempts to reach the aesthetic experience. MindCubes come in various modulations: self-supporting or hanging.

I consider MindCubes to be an evolution of the picture frame. A MindCube event is usually distributed throughout a city connecting indoor locations in a network.

Examples of MindCubes positioned at the Triennale Bovisa in Milano, and in other galleries throughout the city in 2009-2010. The project has involved 4 curators and forty artists so far.

MINDTOTEM: PRIVATE GAZE IN PUBLIC SPACE

A public format for installations I devised and introduced in 2009 meant to study how to attract a viewer to an installation and help him focus on it. Various kinds of mini-containers with mini-installations inside were placed around Milano.

MindTotems is another museology experiment that helps bring art to a wider public, while preserving the possibility of a private, protracted gaze.

Here shown on the streets of Milano with works of Alessia De Montis, CTRLZAK and Susanna Pozzoli. 2009

Sound vibrations create shapes which can be perceived inside the body frame. Could these shapes become art, and could the body itself become a museum room? Close your eyes, feel the sound vibrations within, and gaze at the installations inside.

I worked with audio technicians to design audio equipment and insert it into furniture. I worked with sound designers and musicians to create a visual vocabulary of sound, to be perceived with the body.

Kilohertz installations have been presented in important art and design venues in 2009-2013. I believe this is the future of music.

KILOHERTZ: MUSIC INSIDE

Kilohertz intsallations have been seen at the Kaohsiung biennale in 2009, at the Triennale Bovisa 2009, and at experimental concerts in several venues in Milano. Jagermeister was a main sponsor for many of these.

Contemporary art has one great adversary: distraction. We are literally bombarded by distractions in the places that are supposed to be conducive to contemplation.

Rituals embedded into frames can help us focus. Inspired by medieval tryptics, in 2012 I designed a framing format called Interstizio (from the interstice at its center) and asked a dozen Italian artists to create works within them. I then exhibited these works in various public settings and art fairs (in particular, Kunstart in Bolzano and The Others Fair in Turin).

These are closed boxes. The opening movement of the frame helps focus attention without retorting to a didacticism. The aethetic experience of the work of art concealed within is thus enhanced.

INTERSTIZIO: FRAMING AS PRO-AESTHETIC

In 2013 I designed and launched a curatorial format in the guise of a jewelry line. Each Art Pod accessory (ring, bag, bracelet etc.) can accomodate hidden, replaceable art installations. Art Pods are sold at museum shops such as the ones at the Triennale Museum in Milano, and at the Biennale in Venice.

I had an App created to connect each Art Pod owner who can meet and showcase his or her private exhibition. A new way to network through art.

The product displays (which can also be purchased) are arguably the smallest museums in the world. Art Pod allows everybody to become an independent curator.

Art Pod is another example of network art museum: small but atomized and connected. More info at artpod.it

ART POD: WEARABLE NETWORK MUSEUM

In 2014, in partnership with my wife Luisa and Duilio Forte, I launched IterArs.com an online reservation platform for art studios in Italy.

IterArs offers a curated experience within the art studio. We work with the artists to create an exhibit in their space. We sell “studio crawls” which are meant to provide a “Permanent Biennal” feel. The idea of hopping from one place to the next to see exhibits while also meeting the artist is a perfect blend of experience and culture.

We are now focusing mostly on Milano, Genova, Turin and Rome. We are working with a select group of artists which offer a high quality work, a powerful exhibit and an interesting studio space. IterArs is a new step in my research into new network museum models.

ITERARS.COM: STUDIO NETWORK MUSEUM

BEAUTY INSIDE (Italian)

Collects the experiences and curatorial experiments of ContainerArt . An attempt to provide a new kind of language when talking about art.

A guided meditation narrative voice provides intimate instructions on the way to turn the experience of a contemporary art into a spiritual one.

Published by Proedi Editore. 2008.

BOOKS

NETWORK ART MUSEUMS (English)

Citing examples from dozens of curatorial experiments I conducted, I present a case for changing the way we design conteporary art museums.

No longer confined to a physycal building, Network Art Museums are as atomized as their contents, they are also as connected as their audience.

Published by Castle Books. 2014.