TECHNE III

3rd EDITION

ART AND TECHNOLOGY

THE INFINITE IMAGES. SCREENS, VISIONS, ACTIONS

October 28th 2005 - May 14th 2006

A place – indeed several places – where art and technology meet. Without forcing the encounter. That is how I would describe Techne…
Any selection is by definition arbitrary, whatever the criteria; partial, too, in the sense that it must exclude more than it includes. What we put forward in Techne is a broad, but inevitably by no means exhaustive approach to art based on technology and its capacity for communication; art whose end result is, among the infinite possible contaminations between forms of artistic expression, the video installation: video that goes beyond its natural frame, the screen. It goes without saying that behind the video image – and in front of it, too, everywhere in fact – there is the use of digital technology, now virtually indispensable for everything and everyone. It is doubtless true that, as Antonia Caronia puts it in his essay for this catalog, “the very proliferation of screens diminishes their capacity to create an other space: a repetitive and pervasive representation in daily experience is less and less a representation and increasingly an element of the experience itself.” Yet although contamination is a growing phenomenon in art, breaking down the barriers between what is seen and what is felt, between work and viewer, the focus of this exhibition remains firmly on the image: off screen it may be, multiplied, interactive, denied, mixed, shaken – but still the image.

Center stage at the Spazio Oberdan will be taken up by Bill Viola with his Ascension, on show to Italian viewers for the very first time. With this piece Viola continued his severe exploration of the relationship between human beings and nature and of the concept of life as a pathway or journey. That research culminated in the extraordinary, monumental Going Forth by Day, produced by the Guggenheim Museum in Berlin and New York – who knows if it will ever be possible to bring so large and challenging a project to Milan?

A further eight works will occupy the other rooms at the Spazio Oberdan. So as to give a fair representation of the current state of the art, they have been divided equally: four interactive works (Phases by AGON, m.otu by Mario Canali, Demolição by Luiz Duva, Capriccio Spaziale by  Media_FORMASUONO) centered on sound, movement, emotivity and power; four works (Il mondo di oggi. Qual è la prima parola che ti viene in mente quando pensi al mondo d’oggi? by  A. Bussanich, Dinner Partyby T. Flaxton, L’ultima cena by A. Sachsenmaier, Spoon River by A. Amaducci)that use video to expose fears, hidden constraints, interference between genres, codified behavior…
Studio Azzurro will tread the borderline between ‘interior’ and ‘exterior’ space at the Spazio Oberdan with the symbolic figures of their Dove va tutta ’sta gente?, climbing the glass windows of the center in an attempt to get in (or out) which is emblematic of a world unhinged like our own.
The exhibition itself goes beyond the confines of the Spazio Oberdan into the metropolitan area as a whole: the European Cultural Institutes based in Milan will be hosting one or more works by video artists from their respective home nations(Clockwork for Oracles by U.Rondinone, Chat perché/Immemory  by C. Marker, Existenz Sucht by C. Peintner, Políglotas. Una historia de libros by A. Martín), on their own premises where possible or, in the case of those Institutes without a suitable venue, by contributing actively to the presence of one of ‘their’ artists at the Oberdan. This wide-ranging initiative is a timely reminder that Techne itself is a catalyst for a whole series of actual, potential or scheduled developments, such as the one-man show dedicated to Mario Canali in Monza. With the experience gained to date – and especially after this third event of Techne – the machinery has swung into action. Other voices and other possibilities which failed to find room this time –excluded by necessity, we may say, but regrettably nonetheless – will follow, involving the viewer/participant in the process of digital and technological contemporary art.

Romano Fattorossi

EXHIBITIONS

Spazio Oberdan
October 28th 2005 - February 26th 2006
V.le Vittorio Veneto, 2 (corner P.zza Oberdan), Milan

Arengario Monza
March 16th 2006 - May 14th 2006
Monza
 
Centre Culturel Français
December 13th-22nd 2005, January 9th-13th 2006
Corso Magenta 63, Milan

Centro Culturale Svizzero
November 10th-26th 2005
Via Vecchio Politecnico 3, Milan

Forum Austriaco di Cultura
November 11th - December 14th 2005
Piazza del Liberty, 8, Milan

Hangar Bicocca
February 19th - 22nd 2006
Milan Bicocca

Istituto Cervantes Galleria d'Arte
November 16th 2005 - January 15th 2006
Via Dante, 12, Milan

Exhibition conceived and organised by Aiace-INVIDEO | Curator: Romano Fattorossi | Technological consultant: Italvideo | Translations: Patricia Hampton, John Young | Secretarial services: Elisa Gattarossa, Silvia Scaravaggi |Press office: Aigor | Exhibit, Graphic design: A+G Achilli Ghizzardi Associati | Catalogue edited by: Antonio Caronia | Editing: Valentina di Prisco | Documentation: Elisa Gattarossa, Silvia Scaravaggi | Graphic design: Elisabetta Resconi (A+G Achilli Ghizzardi Associati)