2023-10-09 22:29:25
by PIERLUIGI PANZA
“I showed nature in disintegration.” The Piedmontese artist chosen by the jury chaired by Emilio Isgrò. The finalist works on display until October 15th
The work of the Turin artist Giuliana Rosso, who denounces the eco-anxiety of young people, was awarded the 22nd Cairo Prize for contemporary art, organized by the monthly «Arte» directed by Michele Bonuomo and awarded on Monday 9 October at the Permanente in Milan . The work was chosen from among twenty finalists under 40, «after a head-to-head with at least one other work», by a jury chaired by maestro Emilio Isgrò. This work was awarded because it «represents the restlessness and indeterminacy of adolescence in a toxic environment that evokes the urgency of the environmental issue and the problem of loneliness», we read in the judgment.
The work is entitled We’re fine in the marshes and, in line with the poetics of the thirty-year-old artist, it depicts two adolescents, and a third more hidden one, in a desolate swamp, a sort of ruined forest, among blackened or broken trunks as if after a violent storm. The girls seem to be listening to music alone. The three figures appear close and at the same time closed in an intimate solitude, sealed by the devices they carry with them, namely the crystal headphones and the luminous computer, which also function as prostheses of their bodies. The girls’ sharp anatomy, as well as the predilection for yellows and greens, recall a master of Expressionism such as Ludwig Kirchner. The palette is rich in colors and the production method is rather strange for the contemporary world: it is chalk and charcoal on dusting paper prepared with chalk, a bit like how frescoes were prepared in past centuries.
«I created this work in 2023», says the winner, born in Chivasso in 1992, with slightly grunge clothes and a tone somewhere between emotional and existentialist. «She wants to convey a sense of hybridity of the place where we find ourselves today. While matter is increasingly broken down, nature is decaying.” You could also have a reference to the works of the Polish artist Anna Nowak for that apparent search for an attempt to place the characters as if in suspension. It was the first time that the young artist participated in the Cairo Prize, she declares that she does not know how the recognition will change her profession which, for now, she has as gallery owner «The Address» of Brescia. Woman, ecologist, trained at the art academy of Turin, Giuliana Rosso has been working for about five or six years. Now the first recognition of her.
The Cairo Prize was born in 2000 from the patron’s desire to support young Italian artists, and was a launching pad for many: «23 years after the birth of the prize, over 400 young artists were able to show their talent», said Urbano Cairo. «I am proud to valorise young people: the concrete testimony is given by the over fifty artists who, after having participated in this event, had the opportunity to exhibit works at the Biennale, thus entering the major artistic circuit».
For its final phase, the award returned to its “natural home”, as recalled by Emanuele Fiano, president of the Permanente of Milan, where fifteen editions of the award were presented alongside the previous one. «The history of Italian painting passed here and from here art gives a boost to the city. The award is a work of patronage that serves Milanese culture and we are grateful that it is here.”
The Cairo Prize is created by the magazine «Arte» (Cairo editore) directed by Michele Bonuomo, who recalled the centrality of the work in the awarding of the recognition, a work which, however, must «concentrate the artist’s personality». Although each participant approached the work according to their own techniques, overall there appeared to be a strong re-emergence – if we don’t want to say figurative – of the pictorial discipline, “the reaffirmation of getting your hands dirty with paint”, declared Bonuomo. In this regard, we believe that the works of Roberto De Pinto were also appreciated – with his two young men lying on a carpet of pre-existing sheets, drafts and charcoal sketches that the artist imprints on the canvas as monotypes – and that of Alessandro Sicioldr Bianchi — a queen with eyes full of light that blind as she sits on a rock throne in the style of Maiden of the Rocks. There were, however, also material experiments, such as those by Eltjon Valle, a hybrid new space with resinous materials, the composition with two disturbing crows by Giorgio Salvato, the three-dimensional motorcycle-rebus by Martina Corà and the “ritual” signs on a long Japanese paper roll guarded by a clay puma by Nina Carini.
The twenty finalist works of the Cairo Prize, those of the previous editions of the prize and those of the exhibition that bears the name of the «Arte» magazine (upstairs) will remain on display to the public free of charge until October 15th.
The first edition of the prize was won by Luca Pignatelli with Treno, a locomotive, and it is curious to note that now, as an established artist, from 28 October he will be on display at Villa Malpensata in Lugano with Astratto, forty-nine large-scale works obtained from large portions of disused railway tarpaulins. The first woman to participate in the Cairo Prize was Chiara Dynys, on display from today at the Agnetti Archive with Sante Subito and Fiori. The winners of the last three editions were Fabrizio Cotognini, Amsal Siedlecki and Giulia Cenci.
October 9, 2023 (modified October 9, 2023 | 10:31 pm)
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