Lara Favaretto

Galleria S.A.L.E.S., Rome
Through February 14

One old man says: “What does the sea mean to me? Nothing. A rock and that’s it”; another sets a model glider flying; yet another talks about the nature of the fox and how to hunt it; an amateur chorus has singing practice; and a group of film buffs watch Full Metal Jacket for the thousandth time. With informal editing and a slightly restless documentary style, Lara Favaretto’s recent video captures these personalities and, by way of their short histories, unites the passionate, expressive faces in this gallery she presents. Entitled Il sogno della volpe, the video is being shown alongside a small group of painted portraits. These form the initial nucleus of a project, which will consist of 73 canvases in total, to equal the number of characters in the video.

These are simple images that don’t recourse to sophisticated techniques; even a possible metaphoric reading of the rapport character-environment is denied, as the old man confirms in his reflection on the meaning of the sea. For Favaretto, landscape is only the location in which we spend our free time. Each character is involved in amateur activities. The common denominator is the direct relationship between man and environment. The effect is rendered yet more potent by the dialects that denote the various geographical regions they come from, and the ingenuity of those who partake in the deconstructed, liberating arena of leisure pursuits.

It is this last factor that links the video to the paintings. Depicted using a rudimentary technique, the characters recall images from popular culture, carnival masks, or playing cards. Perhaps the most important quality in these works is the way they avoid exploiting the naivete of these characters, captured in all their glorious authenticity. Favaretto does not search for beauty in the trivial; she does not seek to perform the role of Midas, transforming base materials into gold. The video’s closing music, taken from the italian comic film L' Esorciccio, is perhaps the comic metaphor aimed at precisely such a pretense: if an exorcism, an alchemical reaction, takes place in Favaretto’s work, this is only to be found in her ability to “show it like it is,” without changing or interpreting reality, making the inner, rarefied beauty that exists in even the most grotesque elements of life shine out.




Marcello Smarrelli
Translation by Rosalind Furness