11 May 2015

The technological limbo of the American artist Cory Arcangel has materialized in the Sala dei Giuristi of the oldest city hall in Italy, the Palazzo della Ragione in Bergamo. Deus ex machina of this paradoxical encounter between frescoes and pop culture is the curator of the GAMeC, Stefano Raimondi, who has invited the artist to stage his first solo exhibition in the country. On the ground, the floor is covered entirely by a multicolored carpet, the product of a chance combination of Photoshop gradients. A rainbow of pool noodles marks the perimeter of the room, and each tube is dressed up with gadgets like iPods, collars, handcuffs, sports accessories and sticking plasters winking at the world of animated cartoons. For Arcangel they represent the stereotypes of our society, like the iconic photographic portraits of August Sander almost a hundred years ago. A counterpoint to this population of characters made of polyethylene foam is provided by screens with images and hacked videogames: from Britney Spears to Super Mario Bros. Personages, not persons: loved, forgotten and nostalgically recycled in the dim and distant past. They are the mouthpiece of consumer society 2.0, in which celebrity and commodity seem to coincide, the constant upgrade of technology anticipates the future and the internet preserves the past, transforming it. Cory Arcangel is the demiurge in a pop vein of this expanding universe filled with zombies and relics.

Cory Arcangel, This Is All So Crazy, Everybody Seems So Famous
GAMeC
A cura di Stefano Raimondi
Bergamo
1 aprile > 28 giugno 2015