Carolina Gestri

Metronom: In your constant dialogue with young or emerging artists, can you recognize or identify trends or methods prevalent in the use of moving images?

Carolina Gestri: I would say that in general there is a strong propensity to learn online. The generation that spends whole nights in front of NETFLIX is happy to enrich its cultural background through marathons on platforms such as UbuWeb and Vdrome.* These archives and streaming projects become like libraries for those who are preparing to work with video.

* In this regard, I recommend a beautiful book by Erika Balsom entitled After Uniqueness: A History of Film and Video Art in Circulation.

M:The screen as a traditional support for viewing is losing its uniqueness, leaving room for new technologies such as augmented reality and special viewers for virtual reality: in your opinion, are the ways in which social experience is shared influencing the reflection on the concept of display ?

CG: The screen continues to have its own irreplaceable charm and functionality, as a sculptural presence within the exhibition space, and as a suggestive reference to the cinema. The screen can be both part of a multi-channel installation and the protagonist of a screening program. The screen is a medium but it can also be a message depending on the importance the artist gives to its position in the context of the show and the ratio that the artist chooses for his work. I doubt that it is destined to disappear, on the contrary many artists of my generation who stand with one foot in the cinema and with the other in the visual arts tend to use the single channel and point to the cinematographic-documentary genre with subject, screenplay, crew and cast.
Virtual reality certainly has a great potential, such as capturing the attention and curiosity of various audiences, undermining the concept of democratic-collective vision, prompting us to reflect critically and make us realize how much the internet can lead us to live in an alienating way. As a visitor I can’t imagine being in the middle of a room with a series of people wearing an oculus rift. The viewer becomes an exposed object without realizing it too much. The choice of technology used must be consistent with the message of the work, otherwise there is a risk of transforming the exhibition into a spectacular amusement park. I therefore believe that augmented reality can make us reflect on these issues in a more direct and easy – in the negative sense of the term – way than what Jon Rafman orchestrated in a calibrated manner on the occasion of Il viaggiatore mentale / The Mental Traveller in the spaces of FMAV – Palazzo Santa Margherita (Modena, Italy), an exhibition that particularly impressed me both for the care of the layout of the spaces and for the diversified rhythm of the articulation of the rooms according to the works on display, creating custom-made environments. Let me explain myself: my fear is that something as totalizing as augmented reality does not leave room for reflection. To allow the audience to ask questions, it is important to create a distance between the viewer and what is being observed. Video works like Ed Atkins’ have made us understand how a glitch or any other “mistake” can be instrumental in making us awaken from the digital world. This is what I think the exhibition of a work should create: start a process of disenchantment from the acceleration of the daily routine that does not allow us to reflect on what surrounds us.

M:What is your point of view on the after post-internet aesthetics, now well defined, that uses technologies such as augmented reality and avatars as methods of interaction and representation?

CG:For me, after post-internet is not tied to an aesthetic. It reveals the tricks of the post-internet and shelves them while reaping their legacy. Instead of using the green screen, it shows a green screen as set design, in an almost archaeological way.
After post-internet means being aware of the post-internet condition and moving forward; knowing that virtual exhibition tours exist, but choosing to visit a museum in person. Having Google Maps on your mobile phone but deciding not to open the app, to get lost and find your way asking for help from real people. If post-internet denounced the influence of technology on our daily lives, after post-internet re-educate us to use technology with moderation, making us appreciate and rediscover reality.

M:Has the period of uncertainty that we have experienced (and still are), between distancing and rarefaction, had repercussions or has it led you to question elements of your curatorial practice and of your research, beyond the contingency?

CG: I have difficulty defining myself as curator and consequently recognizing my curatorial practice, but like everyone in this period, I learned to question time and my way of using it in a frenetic way, appreciating slow rhythms and a greater care towards study and human relationships. I hope not to forget it and treasure it.

M:Recently the digital space has offered itself as the only field of interaction, and place of fruition of artistic projects. How can video art, in its forms, exploit the opportunities offered by the digital? Could you tell us about a virtuous project that was born or has found a way to develop over the past few months?

CG:Moving images, like all visual arts, adopt distribution and communication channels already tested in other fields to reach a wider audience. In recent months we have seen a reversal: the artistic projects that have exploited streaming even before the Film Festivals have certainly been precursors. As you will have understood, I defend the “exhibition experience” a lot so I hope that the opportunities that the digital offers us are seen only as a support for sharing content for study purposes and that they are not thought of as a substitute for visiting, meeting or lesson in person. Online databases and temporary online cinemas are welcome, but through the relationship with the works you can relate to cinema and the show, not with a computer or mobile phone. I particularly liked the projects that created an opportunity for sharing and support for the artists, among them: ARTISTS ‘FILM ITALIA RECOVERY FUND (Lo schermo dell’arte) – I don’t think to be biased to say it – by Leonardo Bigazzi , Nuovo Forno del Pane (MAMbo), curated by Lorenzo Balbi and Radio GAMeC. Also noteworthy is the work done by some departments of AWI – Art Workers Italia.

M:Cyclically our society is hit by moments of crisis that force us to recalibrate the coordinates of our actions. How can the contemporary art system act in this particular context, from a medium and long term perspective, both from a sustainability point of view and from the way in which the curators relate to the artists?

CG:I believe that the art system too often is the mirror of a country’s malfunction. We should therefore take some time to think, perhaps for some self-criticism, and think about how to give us a better structure, create new models and ways of use, create a real network, make ourselves more accessible to the public, hoping that in 2021 everything will work better and nobody will believe that the artists are those who”make us laugh some much.”

Carolina Gestri (Florence, 1986) is an art historian, teacher and curator. She is coordinator for VISIO-European Programme on Artists’ Moving Images; co-founder of Kabul Magazine, online magazine and independent publishing company, she teaches Phenomenology of Contemporary Art at IED, Florence and Exhibition Planning at Istituto Marangoni, Florence.

Carolina Gestri

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