BLOW AGAINST THE WALLS
Antonello Ghezzi
Performance Saturday, June 23th, 7-9 pm.
Italian duo Antonello Ghezzi, based in Bologna Italy, brings their interactive performance “BLOW AGAINST THE WALLS” to the Wayfarers artist-run space in Brooklyn, New York.
The project is intended to protest physical barriers around the world, built by humans to keep far away from others.
We want to break walls poetically, quietly, and non-violently, with beauty and sweetness. We want to fight arrogance with naiveté. As long as there is enough breath to blow another bubble of soap we will blow away our anger. -AG
Participants at exhibition will blow bubbles against a large canvas where the photography of K. Flo Razowosky will be projected. The work of Razokowsky, an Ashkenazic, anti-Zionist, queer artist based in Los Angeles, who shares Antonello Ghezzi’s interest in social engagement-based art, becomes part of the performance. With her project, Up Against the Wall, Razokowsky spent roughly six months a year between 2002 and 2008 personally photographing the walls that define the Palestinian territories as well as the borders between Ukraine and Slovakia, Serbia and Croatia, Mexico and the United States, and Morocco and the Spanish city of Melilla.
On the canvas the separation barriers that divide the world will be overwhelmed and modified by countless colourful soap bubbles, that come from the breath of people. The bubbles will impact the the wall and will go through it, unstoppable in their lightness, their pigments, and their hope.
The performance provokes a feeling of whimsy with its lighthearted and participatory approach to an otherwise serious and urgent subject. This feeling is accentuated by the ethereal quality of the evanescent soap bubbles. The piece itself innately embraces chance, since every time the piece is performed or exhibited it becomes different from all previous versions shown, including those at the Petit Bain in Paris, The Art Foundation in Athens during documenta14, the Spazio Testoni in Bologna and the Galerie Tanit in Beirut.
The collective ANTONELLO GHEZZI will be exhibiting this work in the US for the first time. In Europe and the Middle East they are best known for their interactive installation “Mind the door,” an automatic door that opens simply when someone smiles. The collective works with both scientists and businesses to bring art to daily life through installations that combine technology, reality, and poetry. In addition to the venues noted above, ANTONELLO GHEZZI has recently exhibited at the Sound Design Festival of Hamamatsu (Japan), the Italian Institute of Culture in Athens (Greece), the BIEL Center in Beirut (Lebanon), the Usina del Arte in Buenos Aires (Argentina), the National Picture Gallery of Bologna (Italy), the Moscow Biennial (Russia), the Museum of Contemporary Art of Villa Croce in Genova (Italy), the Sarajevo Winter Festival (Bosnia and Herzegovina), the Blik Opener (the Netherlands), the Arsenale in Verona (Italy), and the CIFF in Copenhagen (Denmark).
The performance is supported by the manufacturer of soap bubbles DULCOP S.p.A. of Bologna (IT).