DANIELE ACCOSSATO | FEDERICA BELLI | GINO SABATINI ODOARDI
Curated by Beatrice Audrito
30 March 2024 | 05 May 2024
Opening: Saturday 30 March 06:30 pm
Saturday 30 March the Kyro Art Gallery in Pietrasanta is delighted to present Ossimori del contemporaneo, an exhibition dedicated to the artists Daniele Accossato, Federica Belli and Gino Sabatini Odoardi, curated by Beatrice Audrito. The exhibition juxtaposes a selection of works from these three Contemporary artists, who, despite their expression through the different languages of design, photography and sculpture, share a similar logic in the construction of the visual image. The common element that unites the research of the artists in the exhibition is the oxymoron: a figure of speech typical of spoken language which consists in pairing, in the same phrase, two words that express distant or opposing concepts. Replicating the same modus operandi as used in literature, the artists use oxymoron and paradox, cleverly translated into visual terms, to create ambiguous images designed to place the viewer in an uncomfortable, disorienting situation. The sculptures of Daniele Accossato express an entirely contemporary logic, where reproductions of classical statuary such as the Riace Bronzes or the Venus Italica are bound, gagged or encased in wooden crates or plastic packaging, creating the pretext for reflection on the connection between the art object and its setting. A relationship that often deprives the work of its aura by turning the object into a commodity. Not surprisingly, Accossato’s works reflect on the content-container dialectic, exposing the real contradiction in terms: is it really possible that art as such is also a commodity? The photographs by Federica Belli also play on the aesthetics of the oxymoron, investigating the fine line between our perception of ourselves and the way we perceive and relate to others. Her vision gives us intimate, delicate but also strong and determined images: men and women who are passing through particular stages of life such as adolescence and youth, showing themselves in their nakedness and vulnerability. Nudes with soft lines set in complex architectural contexts of rigorous geometry emphasise the loneliness and fragility of the subjects who occupy almost metaphysical scenes, reflecting on the relationship between form and content.
The research of Gino Sabatini Odoardi reflects on humankind’s attitude towards the unknowability of the world, often using the aesthetics of oxymoron and paradox with the intention of instilling doubt, questioning reality, and upsetting the balance on which our culture rests. Concepts are investigated each time in a new way, where mark, drawing, painting and sculpture intersect seamlessly, generating semantic short circuits between object and represented subject that push the boundaries of representation. To give form to his vision, Sabatini Odoardi uses polystyrene thermoforming: an industrial technique used in the field of plastic moulding that allows the artist to isolate everyday objects and then transform them into complex sculptures and installations or to imprint the graphite mark in drawing by replacing the common sheet of paper with a sheet of polystyrene.
Ossimori del Contemporaneo highlights the similarities and individuality in the research of Daniele Accossato, Federica Belli and Gino Sabatini Odoardi, focusing on the use of the oxymoron in the visual language: a conceptual matrix manipulated by the artists to reflect on the form-content and content-container dialectics, expressing all the contradictions of the contemporary world.
DANIELE ACCOSSATO
Daniele Accossato (Turin, 1987) is a contemporary sculptor. At the age of fifteen he identified sculpture as a congenial communicative method, a place where necessity takes shape. In 2011 he graduated with honours from the Albertina Academy of Fine Arts in Turin. When talking about art and sculpture, he remarks “it is fundamental that each person constantly works to find his or her own medium, the medium that can lead to the most captivating self-expression and to a constant and constructive confrontation with others”.
His research starts with technique, from the alchemy of sculpture, from the icons that identify our cultural and artistic heritage, to then explore the inner dynamics of the human being and the common aesthetic sense. The subjects chosen are archetypes, symbolic images that resonate with us as part of our culture so we may internalise it, filter it and thus overcome it. In its aspect of citation there is a feeling of gratitude even if, in Accossato’s work, these icons are somehow mistreated, concealed, forced, sacrificed. The symbolic act of ‘kidnapping’ iconic works from the past is a desecration: it represents the need to free oneself from an education or tradition that can be limiting in certain cases, freeing oneself from preconceptions and beliefs. At the same time, it is a way to revive these symbols considered untouchable and make them priceless, closer to us and more human.
FEDERICA BELLI
Federica Belli (Mondovì, 1998) is an Italian photographer currently living and working in Paris.
In 2017, while studying Economics and Management at Bocconi University in Milan, she worked as an assistant to Oliviero Toscani at the Benetton FABRICA Research Centre. Later she moved to Paris to pursue studies in Contemporary Art and the History of Photography at the École du Louvre (Paris, France). In 2018, she participated in the SKY Arts TV programme Master of Photography, of which she was proclaimed winner. The following year she moved to New York to assist Chris Buck and work as photo editor at Musée Magazine, in which she still maintains a weekly column. On returning to Italy to give a TEDx Talk on her photographic vision, she gains representation by the Valeria Bella Gallery in Milan.
Her work is characterised by a visual representation of adolescent life that emphasises presence, vulnerability and self-determination. Inspired by the visual cleanliness of her early mentor Oliviero Toscani, her photography is often inspired by the pastoral scenes of her childhood in the Italian countryside.
Since 2021, her works have been exhibited at major European photography fairs, including Paris Photo, Photo London, MIA Photo Fair and The Phair. In 2022, she is invited to participate in the Digital Art Pavilion at the Venice Biennale. After moving to Paris in 2022, her work increasingly includes commissions and publications in magazines such as Vogue Italia, ELLE and Vanity Fair.
GINO SABATINI ODOARDI
The direction taken by Gino Sabatini Odoardi (Pescara, 1968) is marked by an interest in traditional thought, mankind’s attitude (and its continuous need for confirmation) in the face of the unknowability of the world. His intention is to insinuate doubt, to call reality into question, to upset the balance on which our culture rests by unhinging its certainties in a continuous unanswered questioning. The works hover between the sacred and the profane and between the serial modularity of the object and plastic drape.
He is a multifaceted artist with solid references to conceptual art, boasting a rich curriculum of important solo and group exhibitions in Italy and abroad. “Thermoforming in polystyrene” is the technical definition of the procedure used by the artist to realise most of his works. The appropriation of this material process makes him a unique artist on the Italian and international scene.
Decisive encounters during his training include those with Fabio Mauri (performer in 1997 in What is Fascism at the Kunsthalle in Klagenfurt and to whom he was later assistant) and Jannis Kounellis (as a pupil at the Seminar-Laboratory in 1998 in L’Aquila, curated by Sergio Risaliti). Among other awards: in 1999 he received from Alfred Pacquement (Centre George Pompidou) Le prix des Jeunes Createurs at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts in Paris. Participated in the LIV Venice Biennale, Italian Pavilion (Arsenale).
In 2023, Maretti Edizioni published a volume dedicated to him, Tra le pieghe del dubbio, edited by Claudio Libero Pisano and Adriana Polveroni. Since 2017, he has been teaching Ornamental Plastic and Contemporary Plastic Techniques at the Academy of Fine Arts in Frosinone. He lives and works in Pescara.
