Punteggiato di luce, giaceva lì, scintillante
Galleria Mimmo Scognamiglio is pleased to present Punteggiato di luce, giaceva lì, scintillante, a group exhibition that sees the three young artists Anna Bochkova, Evgeniya Pankratova and Chiara Ressetta interacting for the first time in the same exhibition space with their most recent works. The title of the exhibition is intended to evoke the image of a mirror or a reflecting surface of water, which in the history of images have always had supernatural powers. Popular beliefs attribute to the mirror the power to materialise the past and the future, distant events, hidden objects or beings; it would, in short, be a magic eye capable of seeing what is invisible to the human eye. The mirror is here the pretext to discuss the different stratifications of objects and how they add further narrative layers by revealing the hidden truths of the contexts in which they are inserted. Just like the mirror, there are various objects that contain a multitude of symbolic meanings and, voluntarily or involuntarily, the artists in the exhibition use the iconography of the object to open a dialogue between personal experience and collective symbols.
The archiving and reworking of archaeological images and art history have in fact enabled the three artists to bring their own cultural and everyday experience closer to a common sense. Chiara Ressetta portrays shy figures inhabiting timeless places, in which the traces of a decorativism that interweaves different temporalities and loses its rigid boundaries appear. The predella adds a further narrative level and recalls the pictorial constructions of altarpieces: decorative and everyday objects appear, dust catchers that have the capacity to elevate the subjects to another imaginative dimension. Magical instruments, which like portals or amulets allow the attentive eye to enter into contact with the oneiric world. Evgeniya Pakratova captures with stylistic skill some of the symbols of Beato Angelico’s canonical frescoes and perspective views, recalling glimpses of an era that is now over. Hands open the scene onto different worlds to take us into flourishing, floating gardens that symbolise the ideal world and cosmic order. The flower and the hand become the imprints of two worlds that meet and nourish each other, the human being and nature are raised to the celestial world. The ceramic figures, on the other hand, are the work of Anna Bochckova who carries simple, affectionate gestures between cosy cushions, shifting the perception of the artist’s cultural environment to an opposite narrative. In fact, Anna spent her childhood in an Eastern European prefabricated panel house in a social housing context. The figures carry flowers in their hands, one of the most represented subjects in the history of the Renaissance, symbolising the transience and ephemeral nature of feelings such as love and purity.
Within the works of the three young artists, it is therefore always the object that holds the substantial knowledge of what is hidden and the otherwise unseen effects. Affective mirrors that communicate our states of mind in such a way that the image leads one towards the other.
