Viaggio in Sicilia 8: Installation of a permanent work by Claire Fontaine

On Friday June 28th 2019, at 6.00 pm, Planeta presents a permanent work by Claire Fontaine specifically made for the spaces of the Sciaranuova estate in Passopisciaro (Etna), within the frame of the eighth edition of Viaggio in Sicilia, Planeta Culture for the Territory, a project, curated by Valentina Bruschi.

The site-specific work by Claire Fontaine, entitled, Ettore Majorana, derives from the ideas developed during the artist’s nomadic residency, which took place in October 2018, the time of the grape harvest on Etna. This marks the beginning of a new orientation of Planeta’s project now aimed at creating a series of outdoor art installations in their wine estates.

“We have always thought of specific projects to promote the different territories in which we produce our wine, with the desire to weave a fruitful dialogue between creativity and the environment”, Alessio, Francesca and Santi Planeta affirm. “This new project is a natural development of, Viaggio in Sicilia, which we began in 2004, sharing with artists the places where we work, locations full of history, natural beauty, culture and that have always inspired us.”

The title of the 20 metre long light installation is, Ettore Majorana, the illustrious physicist who died in 1938, who – as a boy – spent his summers in the family estate, near Sciaranuova. The material chosen by Claire Fontaine for the work belongs to the tradition of conceptual art and is characteristic of her artistic research. Light and writing allow “enlightenment”, the first physically and the second in an aesthetic and theoretical vision, intertwining different narratives between the passion of man for knowledge, the symbolic light of ideas and the energy of nature represented by the volcano that dominates the territory.

As Claire Fontaine tells us, “the work refers to a passage in the book, The Disappearance of Ettore Majorana, where Leonardo Sciascia draws a metaphysical portrait of the scientist. Majorana appears intent on staging his destiny as a genius but also wanting to escape from it. He is described as being at one with nature like a bee or a plant, but that he could also escape this, that he had a margin, a possible line of escape “.

The text that composes the work, which will be unveiled on the day of the opening, lends itself to multiple interpretations and can also be read as a description of conceptual art in general, in particular to the artistic practice of Claire Fontaine, for whom quotations are not an added value but a form of dissemination of knowledge in places and contexts that are often unexpected”.

The catalogue of the project will be presented on the same day, a bilingual publication in Italian and English with images and texts by Valentina Bruschi, Donatien Grau (his job description can be a footnote if necessary), Vito Planeta and the interviews with Claire Fontaine and the photographer of Viaggio in Sicilia #8, Roselena Ramistella.

The trip was documented by a photographic reportage, Roselena Ramistella (Gela, 1982, winner of the Sony World Photography Award, Natural World and Wildlife section, 2018) visible on planeta.it/viaggioinsicilia, with images illustrating the places visited during the grape harvest of 2018.

Claire Fontaine is a collective artist founded in Paris in 2004. She takes her name from a popular stationery brand in France, and is composed of Fulvia Carnevale and James Thornhill, who call themselves the assistants of Claire Fontaine, emphasizing the importance of collaboration in artistic practice and identifying a crisis in the figure of the author. Their research uses various media, with particular attention to the use of neon and the written word. Their works are born from an analysis of the contradictions of contemporary society. Claire Fontaine was a 2013 finalist in the prestigious Prix Marcel Duchamp and her works have been presented in numerous international exhibitions. Recent solo shows include: The Jewish Museum in New York (2013), the Wattis Institute for Contemporary Arts in San Francisco (2013), the French Academy in Rome – Villa Medici (2016), the Neuer Berliner Kunstverein (2017), the Städtische Galerie Nordhorn (2018), the Shanghai Biennale (2018), Le Confort Moderne, Poitiers (2019) and the Palazzo Ducale in Genoa (2019).

Information

project: Planeta Culture for the Territory – Viaggio in Sicilia

artist: Claire Fontaine

curated by: Valentina Bruschi

photographer: Roselena Ramistella

opening: Friday June 28th 2019, at 6.00pm

address: Planeta Winery, Sciaranuova, Passopisciaro (Castiglione di Sicilia), Etna. 

open to the public: from June 29th by appointment

telephone: Tel. +39 0925 1955460

email: eventi@planeta.it 

web site: www.planeta.it/viaggioinsicilia

social: #VIS8 #planetawinery #readymadeartist

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