Forms of non-power, 2019, installation view, Artissima Present-Future, Turin
Caterina Silva’s painting is an attempt at letting the space speak; eluding the straight forward production of meaning, her works are open to interpretation. Using various materials, layers of texture and techniques, such as frottage, traces of pour, folds, erasure with a washing machine, she masters controlled randomness to create topographical portraits - the canvases are body size, vertical. Silva’s floor pieces made of leftover elements demonstrate her conception of the painting as an object. Word-less and sign-less, yet the work is not abstract, it enacts a reflection on power and powerlessness. In her performances, language resurfaces just as in the video “Diario Manifesto”, which paradoxically completes her practice, by being full of words and images. An ongoing video collage, this work reconstructs the struggles for freedom in Rome in the 1960 and 70s.
Text by Emilie Villez
Cat. Artissima 2019
Text by Emilie Villez
Cat. Artissima 2019
Caterina Silva, Unpowered XR, 2020, Bosse&Baum @ Vortic Collect, London
Bosse & Baum is pleased to introduce a solo exhibition titled Unpowered of new works by Caterina Silva, as part of London Collective on Vortic Collect. The virtual exhibition consists of seven paintings visualized on a computer desktop wallpaper that depicts a mountain view. The paintings belong to the body of work titled Forms of non-power, made in 2019. The choice of a neutral Apple desktop image as the exhibition’s background is a simple way to highlight the algorithmic nature of the display, through the medium of Vortic Collect and to interrogate reality after the consistent shift toward its extended version, caused by the post-pandemic setting and future scenarios.
The virtual exhibition can be seen on Vortic Collect, while another aspect of the project will be translated into an audio-visual format, via Vimeo and Instagram. For this, Caterina Silva asked some curators, artists and friends to submit a short description of the paintings in the exhibition and translated them into bodily movements. The texts have been processed through a vocal assistant while the movements have been translated into a 3D animation and edited into a short film to accompany the online exhibition. While the paintings on show attempt to escape language and definitions, longing for a more ineffable and intuitive dimension of existence and perception, the voices in the video try to re-establish the lost connection that links words and meanings, language and reality. At the same time the words come from different people and perspectives, opening up the paintings towards multiple interpretations and alluding to the old magic power of language to transform and give shape to reality, in this case through action in the virtual realm.
The virtual exhibition can be seen on Vortic Collect, while another aspect of the project will be translated into an audio-visual format, via Vimeo and Instagram. For this, Caterina Silva asked some curators, artists and friends to submit a short description of the paintings in the exhibition and translated them into bodily movements. The texts have been processed through a vocal assistant while the movements have been translated into a 3D animation and edited into a short film to accompany the online exhibition. While the paintings on show attempt to escape language and definitions, longing for a more ineffable and intuitive dimension of existence and perception, the voices in the video try to re-establish the lost connection that links words and meanings, language and reality. At the same time the words come from different people and perspectives, opening up the paintings towards multiple interpretations and alluding to the old magic power of language to transform and give shape to reality, in this case through action in the virtual realm.
SEVEN PAINTINGS, 2020
©Caterina Silva
Text in order of appearance:
Alfredo Cramerotti, Cristiana Anfosso, Bea McMahon, Adele Tulli, Emilie Villez, Elizaveta Pavlovna Buzytsky
Cristina Kristal Rizzo, Marcelle Joseph, Ilaria Gianni.
©Caterina Silva
Text in order of appearance:
Alfredo Cramerotti, Cristiana Anfosso, Bea McMahon, Adele Tulli, Emilie Villez, Elizaveta Pavlovna Buzytsky
Cristina Kristal Rizzo, Marcelle Joseph, Ilaria Gianni.