An exhibition in Certaldo on Stoner, John Williams' literary masterpiece

Through January 10, 2021, the Palazzo Pretorio in Certaldo is hosting the exhibition Stoner. Landing Pages, a contemporary art group show loosely inspired by the novel Stoner by John Edward Williams (Clarksville, 1922 - Fayetteville, 1994), and curated by Cinzia Compalati and Andrea Zanetti. The exhibition, after a preview held in Pescara in 2016 and following a crowdfunding campaign involving art lovers and bibliophiles, is presented in Certaldo for the first time in its entirety, with the addition of an unpublished work by Emiliano Bagnato and the context-specific remodeling of the installations. The works on display are by eight contemporary artists: Emiliano Bagnato, Mauro Fiorese, Stefano Lanzardo, Roberta Montaruli, Eleonora Roaro, Jacopo Simoncini, Giuliano Tomaino and Zino.

The exhibition retraces Williams’ well-known novel, a literary case that has captivated thousands of readers around the world: the biography of an anonymous university professor who, at the turn of World War I and World War II, faces the dramas and passions of an ordinary life. The eight artists, different in poetics and training, were asked to bring the characters and atmosphere of the novel to life through their own language: photography, installations, music, evideo performance. Not just the expressive reproduction of Stoner’s pages, but, the curators emphasize, “the appropriation of the protagonists in order to dig their depths, to externalize the unspoken and the unwritten, to channel the narrative into the suggestions of visual force.”

Emiliano Bagnato (La Spezia, 1993), composer and sound designer, plays Grace, Stoner’s daughter. In a musical and interactive reinterpretation, all the drama of a character who has suffered the stories of her parents, without blame. Mauro Fiorese ’s (Verona, 1970-2016) works from www.libraincancer.it, the blog in which he chronicled his personal battle with cancer, are on display after his untimely death. Keeping with the literary setting of the exhibition, the author composed twelve photographic diptychs that develop in the pure image and its, arbitrary, textual reference. In the exhibition he plays Gordon Finch, Stoner’s fraternal friend, and filters through his eyes (and thus through the great theme of friendship) the protagonist’s life. Stefano Lanzardo (La Spezia, 1960) is Stoner. With four photographic shots, as many symbolic moments of the protagonist’s existence are described: from the land that spawned him, and to which he returns, to the corridors of the university in which he strolls like a ghost, to the study at home, where he could devote himself to his beloved readings, to his relationship with the women in the novel. A journey with a strong anti-heroic and anti-epic framework that transforms the life of a man forgotten by all into a collective tale. Roberta Montaruli (Turin, 1978) is Katherine, Stoner’s lover. The Turin-based artist tells their love story in a video-installation in which, lacking anthropic presence, it is the objects that narrate their lives, made up of breaths and sighs, joys and sorrows, fatigue and tension toward happiness. An animation video that is created and erased through the use of charcoal and rubber.

Eleonora Roaro (Varese, 1989) has created for the exhibition a video installation dedicated to Edith, Stoner’s wife, in which she brings to light all the phobias of the character, a distant, anaffective woman who does not let herself be “touched” in any sense. Through a synecdoche (Edith is represented only by her cerulean eye) she becomes the “surveillance camera” of the lives of those around her. Also on display is the video-document of a performance in which she played Edith in one of the novel’s topical moments. Jacopo Simoncini (Carrara, 1979) composed for the exhibition an unpublished piece for viola (performed by Ignazio Alayza) that narrates through shudders the shrillness of existence. Giuliano Tomaino (La Spezia, 1945) plays Stoner’s father, carrying on the historic “Saints” series with an installation that stops the moment of his death. Zino (Teramo, 1973), known for works made with Legos and augmented reality, here plays Stoner’s antagonist and immortalizes him at the moment when he makes his first appearance in the novel: physically maimed, Lomax has a film actor’s face on which the artist reports the words of his introduction within the text.

The exhibition is open to the public from Sept. 5 to Oct. 31 daily 10 a.m.-1 p.m. and 2:30-7 p.m., from Nov. 1 to Jan. 10 on Mondays, Wednesdays, Thursdays and Fridays 10 a.m.-1 p.m. and 2:30-4:30 p.m.; Saturdays and Sundays 10 a.m.-1 p.m. and 2:30-5:30 p.m., closed Tuesdays. For information and further information: info@museiempolesevaldelsa.it, www.museiempolesevaldelsa.it.

Image: Zino, Sono Lomax (2016; digital print on synthetic fabric, 150 × 150 cm)

An exhibition in Certaldo on Stoner, John Williams' literary masterpiece

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