If by “bitter blood” (sangue amaro in italian) we mean that anger, or rather, that resentment certain situations leave us with, perhaps not everyone knows that this saying has a scientific basis. «Anger causes bile to spill into the blood, giving it a bitter taste,» explain curators Riccardo Vailati and Giorgia Massari, who developed the group exhibition titled Oltre il Sangue Amaro from this reflection. On the theme of resentment, here considered in its most general sense, referring to pain in a broad sense, they have created an exhibition path that takes shape in the Neoclassical rooms of Palazzo Moretto Cavour in Brescia, home to MO.CA, the Center for New Cultures. The exhibition, which opens this Saturday, June 8, will go beyond the exhibition path, including a series of video and poetic interventions on the opening day that will delve deeper into the theme. But let’s better understand what it’s about.
«The exhibition path Oltre il sangue amaro comes to life with the intention of starting a discourse that considers the diversification and the extent of these pains and psychosomatic reactions. A cognitive analysis that takes place both objectively, proposing lines of reasoning that lead to targeted and absolute reflections, and subjectively, revealing the forms these pains can visually take within a personal journey of growth and suffering,» reads the curatorial text.
Emotions at the Center
The artists involved—Luca Assi, Ludovica Anversa, Matteo Bianchini, Luca Brama, Nera Branca, Guido Corbisiero, Lucrezia Costa, Camilla Dalmazio, Carla Giaccio Darias, Valeria Quaini, Beatrice Sancinelli, Pierluigi Scandiuzzi, Ivana Sfredda, and Leilei Wu—thus bring emotions to the center of the discussion, approached through different mediums and with different meanings. For example, from Luca Brama‘s photography, which uses the form of a photographic diary as a pretext for intimate analysis, to Lucrezia Costa’s installation evoking «a soul as heavy as a boulder,» or Guido Corbisiero‘s work addressing the theme of old age, paying tribute to his Nonna Silvia, the title of his unpublished work.
The video component is brought by two artists. On one side, Beatrice Sancinelli with a short film that reflects—through a personal lucid dream—on the doctor-patient relationship in the context of psychoanalysis. On the other side, Camilla Dalmazio delves into herself with literal introspection, using a fibroscope. Painting, widely explored here, features works by Luca Brama, Matteo Bianchini, Ludovica Anversa, Pierluigi Scandiuzzi, and Carla Giaccio Darias. In short, a rich journey that unfolds in the five Neoclassical rooms of an eighteenth-century palace, whose decorations sharply contrast with the extremely contemporary language of these young artists.
Al di là della carne, più in là della sensazione.
Attraverso la soglia, sovrastando il dolore.
Oltre il bene e il male, dentro il peso di un’anima.
Distillando liquido nero e dolore rosso,
facciamo sangue amaro.
