Sunflowers
Maisone Pelgrims, Bruxelles
2018
Materials: sunflower, mixed media organic and sintetic, copper.
Photos by Isabelle Arthuis and Zooo
The work of Alberto Scodro is related to the Italian tradition of Arte Povera, and could be in the movement that Jane Bennett defines as vitalist materialism. Indeed, the life of matter is a recurring concern in most of Scodro’s works. He cultivates his garden, and lives almost in self-sufficiency. The natural elements feed him literally and figuratively, they define his practice. For Norma he presents Sunflowers. The sunflowers needed for the piece were grown in his garden several years ago, then dried in his workshop. He covered them with resin, and then stained them and glued them together. Such material groupings are similar to cells in process of mitosis, or beehives. His sunflower hearts are suspended in levitation in the space.
He sees them as suns and arranges them in constellations. The word «Sunflower» can be understood here in its most literal sense. In this work, the sun is a flower as the flowers are suns. In its cells, space holds time, compressed. The strange choreography of sunflowers takes place in nature both individually and simultaneously, all directed towards the heat of the light. In this case, these singular flower-beings are welded into inseparable entities, all turned towards different axes. Walking around the sculptures that turn on themselves slowly, we become their satellites. The objects determine and catalyse our movements and our gaze. A ballet of plants as beings, the magic of attraction, Scodro’s work reveals an esoteric aura.
This alchemy is still more present in the sculpture U.G. Mash, presented in the winter garden. It takes the form of a cluster of matter that reminds us of strange oceanic fungi, or an atomic explosion. Clumped in a frozen eruption of materials such as quartz, silica, phosphates, pigments, and bronze, U.G. Mash questions the invisiblein the process of natural stratification of minerals. From the liquid state in contact with the fire, to the solid state at the moment when it finds contact with the air, matter comes alive and leads a journey where chance crystallises time, space and energy.
Maud Salembier
2018
Materials: sunflower, mixed media organic and sintetic, copper.
Photos by Isabelle Arthuis and Zooo
The work of Alberto Scodro is related to the Italian tradition of Arte Povera, and could be in the movement that Jane Bennett defines as vitalist materialism. Indeed, the life of matter is a recurring concern in most of Scodro’s works. He cultivates his garden, and lives almost in self-sufficiency. The natural elements feed him literally and figuratively, they define his practice. For Norma he presents Sunflowers. The sunflowers needed for the piece were grown in his garden several years ago, then dried in his workshop. He covered them with resin, and then stained them and glued them together. Such material groupings are similar to cells in process of mitosis, or beehives. His sunflower hearts are suspended in levitation in the space.
He sees them as suns and arranges them in constellations. The word «Sunflower» can be understood here in its most literal sense. In this work, the sun is a flower as the flowers are suns. In its cells, space holds time, compressed. The strange choreography of sunflowers takes place in nature both individually and simultaneously, all directed towards the heat of the light. In this case, these singular flower-beings are welded into inseparable entities, all turned towards different axes. Walking around the sculptures that turn on themselves slowly, we become their satellites. The objects determine and catalyse our movements and our gaze. A ballet of plants as beings, the magic of attraction, Scodro’s work reveals an esoteric aura.
This alchemy is still more present in the sculpture U.G. Mash, presented in the winter garden. It takes the form of a cluster of matter that reminds us of strange oceanic fungi, or an atomic explosion. Clumped in a frozen eruption of materials such as quartz, silica, phosphates, pigments, and bronze, U.G. Mash questions the invisiblein the process of natural stratification of minerals. From the liquid state in contact with the fire, to the solid state at the moment when it finds contact with the air, matter comes alive and leads a journey where chance crystallises time, space and energy.
Maud Salembier
