A white noise. Frequencies and visions from the Peninsula

curated by Andrea Bruciati

A white noise. Frequencies and visions from the Peninsula

curated by Andrea Bruciati

October 2014

01_Un Rumore Bianco. Frequenze e Visioni dalla Penisola. Assab One, 2015. Foto Silvia Mariotti

IN COLLABORATION WITH
Mario Mazzoli

Mario Airò, Meris Angioletti, Antonio Barletta, Riccardo Benassi, Marco Bernacchia, Davide Bertocchi, Enrico Boccioletti, Guido Canziani Jona, Gabriele De Santis, Sara Enrico, Roberto Fassone, Francesco Fonassi, Anna Franceschini, Riccardo Giacconi, Francesca Grilli, Giorgio Guidi, Diego Marconi, Maurizio Mercuri, Ryts Monet, Liliana Moro, Lorenzo Morri, Donato Piccolo, Agne Raceviciute, Michele Spanghero, Elisa Strinna, Luca Trevisani, Void

A white noise is a particular type of sound characterised by an absence of periodicity in time and amplitude constant over the entire frequency spectrum. It is called white by analogy with the fact that a similar spectrum of electromagnetic radiation within the band of visible light would appear to the human eye as white light.

In reality a white noise cannot be visualised; it does not exist. The subject of this exhibition centres on the definition and focuses on Italian art production of the past decade, dealing with sound and on it’s sensorial implications. Thanks to the presence of a significant number of participating artists and works, the visitors of the show will be able to appreciate the many different medias and the wealth of this artistic production, which reveals a vitality of expression and a potential which are still quite superficially investigated.

Suggesting a mixed neo-Dadaist and conceptual framework, the exhibition emphasises the fundamental role of Milano as a laboratory of experimentation and research related to sensory frequencies in visual arts:  significant artists like Luigi Russolo, John Cage and Giuseppe Chiari have in fact found in Milan a cultural humus, favorable to the development and dissemination of their most compelling works.

A White Noise. Frequencies and Visions from the Peninsula is included in the program of Milano Cuore d’Europa, a multidisciplinary cultural project launched by the City of Milan.  The program is dedicated to reveal the European identity of the city through the figures and movements which, with their own history and artistic production, have contributed to build European citizenship and cultural identity.

Commento alla mostra, di Andrea Bruciati

Walking through the darkened aisles of the former factory, I finally begin to listen to the exhibition. I like to imagine a primordial frequency acting as a connective tissue—a muted, seemingly colorless vibration that points to the essence of each work. A white noise. Oscillations, underlying energies like resonating waves—the exhibition becomes a pulsating body, almost biological. Like in a shadowy archipelago, works emerge that powerfully engage the senses.

The variety and richness of the pieces remind us that sound is a gradient, a vital force not to be understood in isolation.
Could it be an apparently anarchic, yet profoundly Italian, approach to such a versatile medium? The Futurists already noted that without sound, there is no movement, and thus no life—no social relationship, no collective spirit of belonging.

I move on, and everything confirms it: the works possess a vital, almost sensual presence—as if the Beginning had to be auscultated, demanding attention in spite of the constant stream of indistinct phonemes that flood our daily imagery.

WHITE NOISE

opens with a faint whistle and a monitor that seems static, yet resolutely leukophilic—and closes, like a chiasmus, on the second floor with a sculptural composition that overtakes the room, and a black-and-white video that vibrates like an auroral collapse.

Along the stations of the exhibition, sulfuric eggs, lenticular organisms, totems, pods, breathing speakers, anonymous conduits, cracked walls, and musical scores soaked with too much water and harmonics pinned to the wall alternate and unfold.
Subaquatic poetry, shreds of a concert, core samples from the web, primordial calls blend into a new vision of nature—Symbiosis 2.0—where languages unravel like reptiles.

Auricular pavilions give way to ramified sound samples; dialogues solidify into abstract images that counterpoint a simple gesture or pigments sliding down the wall like musical notations.
Everything is fluid and evocative at once, fragile and revealing—unveiling a different kind of liquid dimension, like the remembered patter of rain on an umbrella that has stayed too dry.

Percorrendo nel buio le navate dello stabilimento, ascolto finalmente la mostra e mi piace pensare ad una frequenza primigenia che funga da collante: una vibrazione sorda e apparentemente senza colore che rimanda all’essenza di ogni lavoro. Un rumore bianco. Oscillazioni, energie sottese come onde vibranti e la mostra si fa corpo pulsionale, quasi biologico: come in un arcipelago umbratile, emergono opere dal forte richiamo al sensoriale. L’articolazione e la ricchezza delle prove, ricordano come il suono sia gradiente e strumento vivificante mai osservato in maniera autonoma. Che sia una cifra apparentemente anarchica e compiutamente italiana nell’affrontare uno strumento così versatile? Già i Futuristi rilevavano come senza suono non vi sia movimento e pertanto vita, ma non vi sia neppure relazione sociale e quindi spirito collettivo di appartenenza. Proseguo e tutto lo conferma: le opere possiedono una valenza vitalistica, fintanto sensuale, come se l’Inizio dovesse essere auscultato, chiedendo attenzione a dispetto del flusso di immagini quotidiano fatto di fonemi indistinti.

UN RUMORE BIANCO si apre con un fischio leggero e un monitor apparentemente statico nel suo essere perentoriamente leucofilo e si chiude come un chiasmo al secondo piano con una composizione plastica che invade la stanza e un video vibrante in bianco e nero… una sorta collasso aurorale. Lungo le varie stazioni della mostra allora si alternano uova sulfuree, organismi lenticolari, totem, baccelli, casse che respirano, condotti anodini, mura screpolate e partiti musicali imbevuti di troppa acqua e armoniche inchiodate al muro. Poesia subacquea, lacerti di un concerto, carotaggi dal web, richiami primordiali si fondono per una nuova idea di natura in simbiosi 2.0, dove i linguaggi si sciolgono come rettili. Padiglioni auricolari che si alternano a ramificazioni e campionature, dialoghi che si solidificano in immagini astratte fanno da contrappunto ad un semplice gesto o a colori che scivolano lungo la parete come partiture. Tutto è fluido ed insieme evocativo, tutto è fragile ed insieme rivelatore di una dimensione liquida differente, come il ticchettio di una pioggia rimembrata su un ombrello troppo asciutto.

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