In recent months, we have witnessed the creation of various projects aimed at bringing art into our homes: museums have digitised their collections, artists have exploited billboards or started to create directly in the street.
Here we want to tell you about an all-Italian initiative born from the mind of Giuseppe Mendolia Calella, a curator and cultural operator active in Sicily. 

Starting from the need, caused by the pandemic, to find new ways of creating and enjoying art, and combining it with the sudden change in the concept of the home, the LOfFt project was launched on 30 April. 

LOfFt, or Little Operations for Factory Times, is a new micro format of artist residency: For one weekend, Giuseppe Mendolia Calella entrusts his house in Catania, a 30 square metre studio apartment, to an artist. During the two days available, the artist can use the space as he or she sees fit to create a work of art that is destined to remain in the flat and be enjoyed only by the owner, who will discover it at the end of the weekend. 

Due to the pendemic period, the home has gone from being a place to sleep and rest to a place of work, gym, restaurant, and many homes have revealed their inability to accommodate these activities. Now, through LOfFT, the house also becomes an atelier and, finally, an art gallery. 

As mentioned above, the project began on 30 April, when Giuseppe left the keys to his house to Emanuela Barilozzi Caruso, a Roman artist who lives and works in Palermo and whose art takes the form of drawings, photographs and performances. 

Emanuela first adapted the place to suit herself, moving the furniture and clearing a wall on which she then created her work: a drawing depicting a character with a man’s torso and a dinosaur’s head, intent on removing it as if it were a mask.

“When I entered the house, the first thing I knew I was going to do was just one thing: write or draw on the walls, act on the walls! I perceived the house as a cave on which to leave a “mark” that could not be easily removed and that would last over time…”

Follow LOfFT on Instagram to keep up to date with the next artists taking part in the project!