Nicola Gobbetto
14 Dec 2013 - 28 Feb 2014
NICOLA GOBBETTO
Bread & Cola
14 December 2013 - 28 February 2014
Galleria Fonti is pleased to presentBread & Cola, third solo exhibition by Nicola Gobbetto in the gallery.
For his new group of works, Nicola Gobbetto ( Milan, 1980) has chosen to pay tribute to Rudolf Nureyev in the occasion of the twentieth anniversary from his death.
The classical ballet is an extension of the fairytale world where the artist is very close to and Nureyev’s life looks like coming out from a fairytale book: his ambition, discipline, his rebellious spirit, his charisma and magnetic charm will bring him to become the greatest dancer of the twentieth century. Revolutionary figure, Nureyev emphasized the male dancer getting to obscure the female one that until then had been the undisputed protagonist.
In the short film titled Pork Lake,realized usingthe animation technique rotoscope and following choreographies by Nureyev taken from vintage footage, tracing his dance steps frame by frame, the princess/swan, symbol par excellence of the romantic ballet, becomes a little pig. Gobbetto highlights the conflicting relationship that Nureyev had with his partner on the scene, his demanding that man would have the same role of woman on the stage, loosing therefore his simple function of “support” that he had had till then. The video explicitly refers itself to Nureyev’s participation as guest in the TV series The Muppet Show in 1978: unforgettable episode in which the Tartar dancer dances with a female dancer dressed like Miss Piggy in a costume specifically realized.
During the practises for the participation in The Muppet Show, the female dancer, mortified inside her clumsy Miss Piggy’s dress, fell down continuously because of the slippery parquet so Nureyev suggested to wash the floor of the studio with Coca Cola to make it sticky.
Starting from that episode Gobbetto realizes Miss Piggy I ❤U, an installation referred to the professionalism and perfectionism of Rudolf Nureyev and composed by a series of Coca Cola bottles, a bucket and besom laying on a parquet corner.
The painting/portrait on canvas Rudy and the installation You can't fail!, composed by a mirror on which are printed Nureyev’s eyes and by a bar to make dance exercises, put the viewer under the deep and strict gaze of the dancer so that the viewer is invited to exhibit himself in front of him with the fear to be rebuked by the number one.
The painting Majesty/Fragility is the reinterpretation by Nicola Gobbetto of the photographic nude that Richard Avedon realized for Nureyev and in which the power of Rudy comes out as his sexuality that always tortured him up to self destruction.
Lost genetationreinterprets another photograph by Richard Avedon, Rudolf Nureyev’s foot: symbol of all his control, his power, his strength. In 1993 The New York Times published the same photo with the caption “The Lost Generation”, inverting thus all the values that the snapshot expressed.
La scala di panedepicts a dream that Nureyev confided to Carla Fracci: his wish to go back to Soviet Union. In the dream, Rudolf went up a stairs made by slices of bread, symbol of his modest origin, and at the top of the stairs there was his mother crying. In the photographic print by Nicola Gobbetto, to wait for Nureyev at the top of the stairs of bread is his dance teacher, his second mother, the one who formed and educated him. The work refers to a video document in which Rudy, once back to homeland after 25 years of exile for high treason, on invitation of Gorbaciov, managed to pay a visit to his dance teacher Anna Udaltsova, centenarian at that time.
Bread & Cola
14 December 2013 - 28 February 2014
Galleria Fonti is pleased to presentBread & Cola, third solo exhibition by Nicola Gobbetto in the gallery.
For his new group of works, Nicola Gobbetto ( Milan, 1980) has chosen to pay tribute to Rudolf Nureyev in the occasion of the twentieth anniversary from his death.
The classical ballet is an extension of the fairytale world where the artist is very close to and Nureyev’s life looks like coming out from a fairytale book: his ambition, discipline, his rebellious spirit, his charisma and magnetic charm will bring him to become the greatest dancer of the twentieth century. Revolutionary figure, Nureyev emphasized the male dancer getting to obscure the female one that until then had been the undisputed protagonist.
In the short film titled Pork Lake,realized usingthe animation technique rotoscope and following choreographies by Nureyev taken from vintage footage, tracing his dance steps frame by frame, the princess/swan, symbol par excellence of the romantic ballet, becomes a little pig. Gobbetto highlights the conflicting relationship that Nureyev had with his partner on the scene, his demanding that man would have the same role of woman on the stage, loosing therefore his simple function of “support” that he had had till then. The video explicitly refers itself to Nureyev’s participation as guest in the TV series The Muppet Show in 1978: unforgettable episode in which the Tartar dancer dances with a female dancer dressed like Miss Piggy in a costume specifically realized.
During the practises for the participation in The Muppet Show, the female dancer, mortified inside her clumsy Miss Piggy’s dress, fell down continuously because of the slippery parquet so Nureyev suggested to wash the floor of the studio with Coca Cola to make it sticky.
Starting from that episode Gobbetto realizes Miss Piggy I ❤U, an installation referred to the professionalism and perfectionism of Rudolf Nureyev and composed by a series of Coca Cola bottles, a bucket and besom laying on a parquet corner.
The painting/portrait on canvas Rudy and the installation You can't fail!, composed by a mirror on which are printed Nureyev’s eyes and by a bar to make dance exercises, put the viewer under the deep and strict gaze of the dancer so that the viewer is invited to exhibit himself in front of him with the fear to be rebuked by the number one.
The painting Majesty/Fragility is the reinterpretation by Nicola Gobbetto of the photographic nude that Richard Avedon realized for Nureyev and in which the power of Rudy comes out as his sexuality that always tortured him up to self destruction.
Lost genetationreinterprets another photograph by Richard Avedon, Rudolf Nureyev’s foot: symbol of all his control, his power, his strength. In 1993 The New York Times published the same photo with the caption “The Lost Generation”, inverting thus all the values that the snapshot expressed.
La scala di panedepicts a dream that Nureyev confided to Carla Fracci: his wish to go back to Soviet Union. In the dream, Rudolf went up a stairs made by slices of bread, symbol of his modest origin, and at the top of the stairs there was his mother crying. In the photographic print by Nicola Gobbetto, to wait for Nureyev at the top of the stairs of bread is his dance teacher, his second mother, the one who formed and educated him. The work refers to a video document in which Rudy, once back to homeland after 25 years of exile for high treason, on invitation of Gorbaciov, managed to pay a visit to his dance teacher Anna Udaltsova, centenarian at that time.