PRESENTATION: Giovanni Ozzola invites Kiki Smith

The exhibition “Giovanni Ozzola invites Kiki Smith” conceived by Giovanni Ozzola for the tower’s spaces of Galleria Continus opens up a dialogue with Kiki Smith, transforming itself into a two-part story that reveals a subtle yet intense synchronicity between the works of the two artists which consists of: the propensity to embark upon a deep and intimate excursion that probes many directly experienced emotions; the attention and analysis of man’s relationship with nature and the universe.

By Dimitris Lempesis
Photo: Galleria Continua Archive

Giovanni Ozzola invites Kiki Smith with his most recent works, where the artist’s register becomes more intimate and poetic, where Smith reflects on the vastness of the universe, on the female and animal soul, the bearers of an original harmony that is now partly lost, pushing herself to probe the spiritual aspects of the human being, to understand the experiences of the world and the cosmos. In the entrance hall, Ozzola places the accent on the vaulted ceiling, transforming it into a ‘celestial sphere’. “Contando estrellas (homage to Giotto)“ is the faithful reproduction of a starry sky, taken during the lockdown period in 2020. “From the roof of the house,” declares the artist, “I gazed towards the sky, counting the stars, traveling towards an infinity greater than any thought. Those stars that give our precise position on earth were and are the escape route to an unknown place. They are also a measure of time, days and phases, the direction to follow; a limitless horizon “. The entrance acts as a point of union and passage with the adjacent room where Ozzola intervenes with an installation that redefines the space by creating a new horizon using, as on other occasions in the past, the technique of printing on concrete. “The openings that pierce the walls are urban scars, places with such strong symbolism that they become archetypal, they offer us an opening to other worlds. (…) The signs and graffiti are the scars that remind us of our passage. Those structures are our skull and the perspectives our gaze”, the artist explains. Inside the Ozzola room there are two sculptures by Kiki Smith: moon profiles made of bronze that express not only the beauty of natural forms, but also the forces that govern our universe. “The moon is something you can turn to. The Sun is more ferocious; you cannot look him in the eye, while to the moon you can address your prayers, your desires and your sadness, you can pour everything into it. (…) I have always thought that I would like to be like the moon, I would like to be her testimony on earth. (…) Which is a strange thing to think for a person in the contemporary world, but I feel that way, in a certain sense”. This is how Kiki Smith describes her relationship with the moon in a recent interview. The moon is an element that often recurs in the works of Kiki Smith. We also find it represented in Visitors (stars, multiple crescent moons), the tapestry installed in the oldest part of the tower space. Smith’s tapestries, preciously made on Jacquard looms, are chapters of a mythological tale with a surreal background suspended between the Pompeian fresco, symbolist painting and medieval bestiaries. In this work the celestial universe – made up of stars, moon and planets – meets the animal one, giving us the idea of a spiritual harmony that humanity will hopefully be able to rediscover. In the same room Ozzola places a bell. Perhaps fresh from a shipwreck, the artist recovers it, polishes it, and engraves a sentence on it, giving it a new state but not a new function. Here it’s a metaphor of self-affirmation, as on ships, indicating the position: “I am here, in the night, in the dark, or simply with my eyes closed, I feel, I occupy this place, I am part of what surrounds me but I am a center, a focal point”, declares Giovanni Ozzola. If the sea in Giovanni Ozzola’s photos is like a gaze that embraces the horizon, in Dormir by Kiki Smith, space and light converge on a wave on which a female figure rests; as the undisputed protagonist of Smith’s work, the woman represents an original harmony that is now partly lost.

Photo: Giovanni Ozzola, Añaza, 2021, multilayer okumè, microcement, Giclée print, shine inks, variable dimensions, Courtesy: the artist and GALLERIA CONTINUA, Photo: Ela Bialkowska, OKNO Studio

Info: Galleria Continua, Via del Castello 11, San Gimignano, Italy, Duration: 11/9-14/11/2021, Days & Hours: Daily 10:00-13:00 & 14:00-19:00 (book your visit), www.galleriacontinua.com