20/9/2002
Lorenza Lucchi Basili
Noass, Riga
A-B Dambis. Lucchi Basili's project for Noass involves various photographic b/w and color series, and feeds upon the contrast between small photographic modules (as in Space thirty-one, New York, here shown as a European premiere, and Space Twenty-two, Rotterdam, at its first release ever) and others of large dimension (Space nineteen, Paris and Space thirty, Buenos Aires).
Noass is proud to introduce the first solo show in Latvia of Lorenza Lucchi
Basili. Lucchi Basili's work, essentially based upon photographic
installations, often uses other media (sound, text). Her research originates
in an investigation on architectural form to inquire into deep, as yet
unsuspected aspects of human condition in the technological era.
One year after the solo show at Belleza y Felicidad, Buenos Aires, Lorenza
Lucchi Basili presents another project in an alternative non-profit space,
way out of the geography of the art marketplace.
Lucchi Basili's project for Noass involves various photographic b/w and
color series, and feeds upon the contrast between small photographic modules
(as in Space thirty-one, New York, here shown as a European premiere, and
Space Twenty-two, Rotterdam, at its first release ever) and others of large
dimension (Space nineteen, Paris and Space thirty, Buenos Aires).
Also released is the video Space twenty-five, Berlin (on the air a few
months ago at Women with Vision 2002: The Restless Age, Walker Art Center,
Minneapolis and also forthcoming at a three-person exhibition in the
University of Indiana Art Gallery, Terre Haute, early in 2003), where the
homonymous photographic series is mounted in synchrony with an ancient
Byzantine liturgical song.
In all the works on show, in the seemingly synchronic patterns of the black
and white and color photographic series as well as in the explicit
diachronicity of the video, the architectural structures turn into abstract
signs, fragments of an archetypal code. They are doors toward a
contemplative mental dimension which surprisingly sparkles from the
photographic experience of places that are dominated by obsessing rhythms of
activity, deafening noise, poisoned chemical smell. The sublime melody of
the liturgical song in the Space twenty-five, Berlin video, where the flow
of close-up details of huge dock cranes is governed by the in-breath of the
singer, highlights a mysterious yet clear affinity between two apparently
antithetical worlds. An affinity that upsets and moves, prompting questions
about the contemporary sense of commonplace-old-hat concepts such as beauty,
form, rapture.
A catalog with a text by Gabi Scardi is published for the exhibition, which
will be part of the official program of the first edition of Festival
Italiano in Riga, a yearly initiative of ICE-Riga (Italian Foreign Trade
Institute in Riga) aimed at promoting Italian culture, products and way of
life in the Baltic Countries.
Lorenza Lucchi Basili has recently had a solo exhibition at Su Palatu,
Villanova Monteleone, a new space entirely devoted to innovative research on
photographic languages, which has been accompanied by the publication of a
catalog and of a monographic book with texts by Giuliana Altea and Marco
Magnani and by Silvano Tagliagambe. She has moreover recently been part of
group shows at Viafarini (Milan), Walker Art Center (Minneapolis), Kunst
Merano Arte (Meran), New Jersey Center for Visual Arts (Summit), the Art
Center Gallery of Missouri State University (Warrensburg).
Noass is an independent, non-profit space that in the past few years has
presented some among the most advanced and innovative experiences in
contemporary young Latvian and international art, with a special attention
to video art, often in cooperation with like independent realities from
other countries. The exhibition activity of Noass takes place in a huge
house-boat moored on the A-B dambis on the river bank opposite to that of
Old Riga. Noass also develops outdoor projects to make an as rich as
possible contribution to the cultural and artistic life of Riga.
Festival Italiano, September 1-30, various venues, Riga. ICE-Riga: Palasta
9, Riga 1050
e-mail: ice.riga@actek.lv; web: http://www.italtrade.com/latvia
Image: Space thirty-one, New York, barium print on aluminum, 9 x 12 cm, 2001
Noass, A-B Dambis, Riga