Interferenze (Interferences)
Palazzo delle Papesse, Siena
Through January 20
Five Nordic Countries (Norway, Sweden, Finland, Iceland, and Denmark) are compared to one another in order to document, not a determined identity tout court, but a common state of mutability from the same rigid “temperature.” An unexpected sauna in the inner courtyard and another chaotic and noisy installation that joins high tech and DIY in the entryway’s atrium are both works by Markus and Seppo Renvall. The roof terrace is capped by a dark tarpaulin obscuring the usual view of Siena, which is replaced by a slide projection of what seems like part of a soaring metropolis (Psichasthenia 10 series 2 by Knut Asdam).
There are some creations that, out of mere necessity, are isolated from the expositive background, and are proposed as interstices or border areas for a secluded meditation, sometimes silent other times bewildering. Nevertheless, the principle is valid also for the other works that “interfere” with one another, without intentionally creating a dialogue. The concerns are solipsism and internal retreat. It is as though the endless Nordic night has created a common isolation, the space and time necessary for inner reflection. Vibeke Tandberg, and similarly Anneč Olofsson, portray themselves in videos and photographs, documenting a languid intimate landscape; CM von Hausswolff and Leif Elggren proclaim the birth of their Reign displaying their own currency in the Palazzo’s vault; Magnus Wallin has also realized a personal artificial paradise, the fruit of his computerized animation.
One has the impression of having run into a state of calm which is only apparently so. A sense of suspension prevails, a sort of prelude, emblematically rendered in Thorvaldur Thorsteinsson’s work. A theater foyer, an elegant period room, with playbills, coats hanging, and notices that request silence, but the show has already started and a false door is strictly barred, while the melodic echo of the show plays elsewhere in the background, in a hypothetical and totally inaccessible space.
This is the piece that most successfully encompasses the sense of the exhibition: a transformed reality, in constantly acceleration, is always behind the door, while the Nordic artists prepare themselves to confront it individually.
Milovan Farronato
Translation by Amanda Coulson
