Come, see, show

 

Following the video installation 22.48 m² pour___ scheduled for last october 2 , Nombreuxnombrils is the exhibition that will actually give birth to the place 22 , 48m ². It is black and white photographs of navels, taken since 2005 from people that the artist met by chance, or he already knew. Empty frames are also there, that will be filled during the time of the exhibition, by the photogenic visitors navels. Also a loop video installation of these navels will be broadcast.

These photographs developed on matte paper cut in discs may give the impression to the viewer to be faced with a hole through which he would observe someone 's navel . They are hung on the wall in rows of a variable sequence of units by artist Rosario Caltabiano , sometimes just three or four , and sometimes ten , by inserting the empty frames that will receive the newly elected . Rosario Caltabiano presents them as he was composing a personal message with sentences written in navels-words in the exhibition space. This can ultimately evoke us a kind of letter in Morse code , consisting of dots and dashes , which would send us a rather intimate story . A story that observers should however still decode by telling themselves. However , given the diversity of form of these navels , each one is entitled to tell alone something to navelly capture all the attention. Facing this whole scene, which compress and concentrate such a identical crowd wanting itself different, you can lose yourself during a moment : am I really n front of navels ?

The television screen is at the back of the stage at the end of a dark and  narrow corridor, diffuses a silent video of the round images in a crossfade . When we look at these images that change smoothly, their movement product like a whisper in our ear.

For this project , Rosario Caltabiano started very logically from his own navel. Each navel on the wall is presented with his date and place of birth. These two elements are significant : this is the record , set in space and time, which marks the birth, which made two out of one, . Each navel is a divorce. First trace of a long series of pain, first injury for living. Today, these navels are being collected by the care of Rosario Caltabiano , their portrait painter . Present as living fossils , which would go back to that first encounter with the world, to imagine it .

In the context of this exhibition, a booth as a kind of rudimentary Photomaton is set in a corner of the place . This reduced shooting device would organize an intimate encounter , as it was at a confessional, between two people. The discussion could almost turn to the confession . Thus, what the artist archives and engraves, it is also the trace of sharing an experience with the navel .

Each navel, came from a different world, plays its own role "in the nude ." There has for scene only the light . Everyone plays the lead role in his own world, he is the center.

 

 

The place of the exhibition offers an opportunity for these navels to suggest a range of souvenirs. Nombreuxnombrils becomes the place which makes their meeting , their community, communion possible. This is the microcosm 22 , 48m ² wants to become through the various projects it leads . Nombreuxnombrils gives birth to 22 , 48m ².
Come, See and Show ! Do not you let yourself and your track , won't you join this community of world centers collected by Rosario Caltabiano ?

[ LEE, Bo- kyoung ]

 

Born in 1972 in Catania, Sicily. After earning an engineering degree at " Politecnico " in Turin in 1999 , he decided to undertake an artistic research in photography. He took lessons with Enzo Obiso and in 2008 obtained a Masters in Fine Arts at the University PARIS VIII . As part of his studies, his artistic interest widens the video, the short film , installation , intervention , photography , sound and writing. He lives and works between Paris and Italy.

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