Resilience and resistance: environmental artists on display at Turin's Living Art Park

From June 20 to October 20, 2019, PAV Parco Arte Vivente in Turin will host the group show Resilience/Resistance, which, with works by Marco Bailone, Gea Casolaro, Michelangelo Consani, Leone Contini, Piero Gilardi, Michele Guido, Ugo La Pietra and Gruppo Wurmkos, proposes a reflection on the complementary pair of two strategic goals of ecological movements and their social base.

Resistance in its strong social connotation is, as John Holloway says, the expression of a rebellious subjectivity that since ’68 and its revolutionary demands, has gradually grown in all continents where the rapacity of capitalism and neoliberalism have designed new systems and infrastructures to plunder the natural environment and pollute it, clashing with tenacious and enduring movements of opposition such as, for example in Italy, the NO TAV, NO TAP and NO MUOS movements.

Resilience since the early 2000s has become the other strategic axis based on overcoming the ambiguous concept of sustainability and thus on the convergence of the many forms of autonomy and social resistance that operate at the local level and are often already linked together by mutual relationships.

The historical foundation of resilience is identified in the fact that there is no longer an autonomous and “wild” nature since, as landscape architect Gilles Clément says, nature today is hybrid due to the complex and inextricable interactions between human and biosphere forces. Ecological resilience movements experiment locally, but in the concrete a new homeostatic management of the human-nature relationship.

The resilient/resilient strategy, in synergy with other anti-capitalist movements such as anti-colonialism, anti-racism, and feminism, struggle and act with the ultimate goal of changing the macro politics of ecocidal globalized society.

Today’s environmental artists place themselves within this molecular movement of struggle, augmenting with their experiences the elucidation of the ecological crisis, the interconnection of social actions, and the extension of awareness of theAnthropocene crisis to the mass level.

The intent of this exhibition at PAV is to exhibit and popularize the work of a number of Italian artists, attuned to the theme, through the implementation of specific projects in the indoor and outdoor areas of the experimental environmental art center.

There are eight invited artists: Marco Bailone who will paint a mural on the Valsusa struggles; Gea Casolaro who will present the video Prima che la notte duri per sempre and a review of images related to her installation Vivaio Eternot in Casale Monferrato. Michelangelo Consani will place a sculpture of a deer in the PAV park as a “natural” resistance of art. Leone Contini will create an arbor with the cultivation of various types of cucurbitaceae, whose fruits characterize the gardens and canteens of migrant communities in Italy. Piero Gilardi will exhibit his interactive installation on the theme of the sequoia Resilience. Michele Guido on the one hand will exhibit sculptures from the Ceiba Project and on the other, in the park, will cultivate a vegetable garden for the production of seeds of rare and ancient plant species. Ugo La Pietra will place inside the PAV courtyard five gazebos with bonsai trees and objects symbolic of ecosophy inside and in parallel will offer a graphic review of his urban ecology experiences. The Wurmkos group will create a “topia” vineyard with a built-in convivial space on the slopes of the PAV hill.

Before the opening of the exhibition, at 5 p.m., a Round Table will be held with the participation of Marco Revelli, Guido Viale and Barbara, spokesperson for Extinction Rebellion Italia, in addition to the curators.

Within the initiatives planned for the in-depth study of the exhibition, PAV’s Educational and Formative Activities offer various workshops led by the artists themselves.

The first occasion was Michele Guido’s workshop, Cosmos seeds garden project_2014/19, scheduled on March 14 and 15, and the next one will be on June 29, 2019, under the conduction of the Wurmkos group.

Reservations are required to participate in all activities: 011 3182235 - lab@parcoartevivente.it

The exhibition is realized with the support of Compagnia di San Paolo, Fondazione CRT, Piedmont Region, City of Turin, and Fondazione Centro Studi Piero Gilardi.

For all information you can visit the official website of the Living Art Park.

Source: press release

Resilience and resistance: environmental artists on display at Turin's Living Art Park

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