The contemporary exhibition and narrative activity of L'Arsenale di Napoli continues – a cultural startup that won the iQ – i Quartieri dell'Innovazione (Innovation Neighborhoods) program promoted by the Department of Youth Policies and Work of the Municipality of Naples – which aims to ensure that the Neapolitan territory and its regional area of influence are perceived as a single museum.
Starting from May 26 (inauguration at 18 pm), the Arsenale di Napoli presents the installation by Cristina Cusani entitled Quello che non vuoi dimenticare, specifically created for the circular room of Palazzo Fondi (via Medina 24).
An immaterial art project that this time sees Cusani experimenting with a new path, putting herself at stake in the creation of a work that starts from photography but goes beyond the image, where the protagonist will be the sound. As in a darkroom, where latent images become real, small sound sparks will awaken in the mind of the public a series of images that are dormant in the memory.
Cristina Cusani asked the people involved to literally give voice to the memory of something they did not want to forget, looking for the right words, tone and sentence construction to pronounce and record. A collection of memories was born, some from childhood, others from adulthood; the fruit of a moment - and capable of recalling a sudden and unexpected emotion - or repeated over time - and capable of provoking a sedimented and deep affection.
The room, a former mausoleum for the fallen of the First World War – which should be a place of remembrance – in its current condition, which sees it deprived of the names of the fallen once present on the walls, appears in fact as a place where the object of remembrance is in reality absent.
The artist chose to start from this situation of absence to try to transform the entire environment into a place not “of” but “for” memory: a space capable of amplifying the imagination of the visitors, recalling to their mind the image and emotions aroused by the memory. Cristina Cusani's early training as a photographer intervened in the choice to somehow suggest the sensation that, crossing the threshold of the exhibition room, one enters a darkroom for photographic development. In the darkroom the artist has continuously spent over a decade developing photos.
His installation in the Sala Circolare intends, on the one hand, to be a reference, or perhaps even a tribute to the darkroom and the possibility it offers to make real images that remain only latent until the moment of development; but, on the other hand, also an imaginary place in which the latency of the images themselves stimulates the imagination and creative capacities of the visitors.
Her work is an imaginative device, within which images take shape not through a chemical process but through a narrative process. What appears is the fruit of the memories of the many people to whom the artist has turned: friends, relatives and acquaintances from Naples, all individuals linked in some way to her and the city; some who still live there, others who have left it and for whom this territory is only the place of the past and memory.
The voices of today's Neapolitans echo in a monument built to remember the names of yesterday's Neapolitans. The "voices of today" give substance and body to the "voices of yesterday". As with the other projects exhibited in the Sala Circolare at L'Arsenale di Napoli, Cristina Cusani's installation thus becomes an opportunity to represent, in contemporary forms and ways, a specific aspect of the intangible culture of this territory. The installation will remain open to the public until July 2 and can be visited every day from 17 pm to 00 am or by appointment by writing to info@arsenalenapoli.it.
Cristina Cusani (Naples 1984) is a visual artist who mainly uses photography. After graduating in Communication Sciences at the University “La Sapienza” in Rome, she studied photography as an artistic language at the Academy of Fine Arts in Naples. In 2012 she attended the “Laboratorio Irregolare”, a two-year masterclass with Antonio Biasiucci, a very important experience thanks to which she acquired a research method. In her practice she uses everyday experiences as a starting point to analyze the meaning of being human. She works on the residue, on what remains, using the trace, memory, history to investigate the intimate dimension that concerns identity.
Finalist of important awards (Cairo Prize, Francesco Fabbri Prize for Contemporary Arts, An Opera for the Castle, Cramum Prize), he has participated in several exhibitions and artist residencies (BoCs Art, Fondazione Bevilacqua la Masa, Macro Asilo) and his work is part of some contemporary art collections (Imago Mundi Art, Dimensione Fragile, Collezione Scudieri, Curio Collection by Hilton).
Since 2018, with Chiara Arturo, she has been carrying out a project on the Mediterranean as a place of crossing and sharing as an artistic practice. In 2021, she was reported by Exibart among the emerging artists to invest in and since 2022 she has been represented by the Red Lab Gallery. Her training is mainly photographic, but she does not use photography in a pure way, she experiments with it in all its potential. In fact, her research wants to go beyond the medium used and for this reason she has begun to broaden her artistic horizons by also designing site-specific works/installations. She lives and works in Naples.
Article published on May 19, 2023 - 19:30 pm
