Artnews.org: Sergio Zavattieri

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Sergio Zavattieri

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Sergio Zavattieri · Hemerocalle · Pigmented inkjet print on Hahnemühle watercolor paper with albumen and varnish · 89 x 89 cm · Edition of 5 + 1 A.P. · 2006

Sergio Zavattieri - There are no positive solutions to the equation

Art and botanics entwine in the theme of dissimulation, with a subtle iconographic game inserting itself between deception and documentation. A selection of splendid plants come back to life in mystifying photographs…

This ambiguous title acts as an indirect introduction to the game of paradox and dissimulation. Fermat’s Last Theorem is:

If an integer n is greater than 2, then a^n + b^n = c^n has no solutions in non-zero integers a, b, and c.

This mathematical mystery dates back to 1637 and had remained notoriously unsolved. As history would have it, while Fermat was reading the Arithmetica of Diophantus, he wrote the above law on the side of a page, adding the note: "I have a truly marvellous proof of this proposition which this margin is too narrow to contain." It goes without saying that the proof of this theorem was never found, and it was only in 1997, using the most recent discoveries, that attempts to formulate it proved successful. Is it possible that Fermat had already arrived at the solution? Or was he just bluffing? And yet, the theory was indeed correct…

Sergio Zavattieri sets out from afar, then draws us into the perplexing maze of doubt, deceitful truths and Sybilline tricks. It is just such a mysterious Impossible Theorem that is the link with the world of science, an indication of that ambiguous shadow that darkens the logical framework of knowledge.

Acting almost as a scientist, Zavattieri is an attentive observer and cataloguer of precious natural species. To his great enjoyment, in his photographs he evokes the essence of old blank and white prints, imaginary illustrations of botanical textbooks from the early 20th century.

Crisp and extremely elegant, these large images depict many examples of flora, specimens wrapped up in a technological and retro membrane. In reality, they are artificial objects (plants and flowers made of plastic, cloth, resin and paper), photographed by the analytical eye of a researcher. The sophisticated process of digital post-production completes the metamorphosis. Brought almost to life, these mysterious man-made forms trigger the game of deceit, restoring the enchantment of a revitalised laboratory table.

The spell cast by Hiroshi Sugimoto on the waxworks of his Portraits series, both create an illusion, portraying inanimate objects to whom the eye of the lens restores a breath of life.

This echo of the Vanitas style permeates the images of Sergio Zavattieri. It is the seductive power of consumption that illuminates and enlivens these tombstone-like shots. Disguised as delusive still lifes, the everlasting forms face openly a macabre squall of death. The inorganic looks out sneakily from this side of the photographic plane whilst at the same time the vital signs of the epidermis melt into the chilling silence of the lifeless.

Zavattieri toys with a type of photography that is raw, illustrative and documentative. The type of photography that is a “servant of the sciences and arts” as Baudelaire would have had it, functioning simply for recording phenomena. “Let it adorn the naturalist’s library” proclaimed the poet, and let it be nothing else but “the secretary and clerk of whoever needs an absolute factual exactitude in his profession.” Documentation and exactitude seem to be the unequivocal mindset of the photographer from Palermo. That is, if it were not for the accomplished mise en scène that introduces the seed of artificiality and dissimulation which opens his photography out into a dimension that is at the same time literary, theatrical and philosophical.

Helga Marsala
Exibart, 2007

Sergio Zavattieri

1970 born in Palermo, Italy

Lives and works in Berlin, Germany

Education

2000 Graduated Accademia di Belle Arti di Palermo, Italy
2000 Socrates/Erasmus, Facultad de Bellas Artes San Carlos, Valencia, Spain

Solo Exhibitions

(Selection)

2008
- "Alargando el tiempo todo adquiere formas diferentes", La Sala Naranja, Valencia, Spain

2007
- "Non esistono soluzioni intere positive all'equazione", Zelle Arte Contemporanea, Palermo, Italy

2006
- "Botanica", Galleria Arturarte, Settevene Nepi (Viterbo), Italy

2004
- "Líquido, efímero, frío", La Sala Naranja, Valencia, Spain

2003
- "Falso movimiento", Fundación Municipal de Cultura El Puig, Valencia, Spain

Group Exhibitions

(Selection)

2009
-"Transfer Lounge", Forja Arte Contemporáneo, Valencia, Spain. SPACE, Pittsburgh, U.S.A.
- "A compass needle for our starry universe (Un ago di bussola per il nostro universo stellato)", Zelle Arte Contemporanea, Palermo, Italy
- "Beautiful Freak, La belleza de la diferencia", Forja Arte Contemporáneo, Valencia, Spain

2008
- "Out of Time", Axel Lapp Projects, Berlin, Germany
- "Sweet Sheets II", Zelle Arte Contemporanea, Palermo, Italy
- "Digital Media 1.0", LA NAU / Universidad de Valencia, Valencia, Spain
- "The Immaterial Body", Galleria Huuto, Helsinki, Finland

2007
- "Sweet Sheets", Zelle Arte Contemporanea, Palermo, Italy
- "There is no optical in stripes", Produzentengalerie Scotty Enterprises, Berlin, Germany
- "La Familia / The Family", La Sala Naranja, Valencia, Spain. Galleria Maa-tila, Helsinki, Finland

2006
- "Vidifestival06", International Videoart Festival of Valencia, Spain
- "Beautiful Kollaps", Capsvla Artecontemporanea, Rome, Italy
- "Fuorigioco", SP Systema, Pomezia, Rome, Italy
- "O eres tú John Wayne o lo soy yo", La Sala Naranja, Valencia, Spain

2005
- "Plottart.europa", Centro internazionale per l’Arte Contemporanea Castello Colonna, Genazzano, Rome, Italy. MLAC, Rome, Italy. Galería Blanca Soto, Madrid, Spain
- "XXXIII Premio Bancaja", IVAM Centre Julio Gonzalez, Valencia, Spain. Centro Cultural Bancaja, Alicante, Spain. Centro Cultural de La Assunción, Albacete, Spain. Centro Cultural Bancaja de Villarreal, Spain
- "Post Patetic", La Sala Naranja, Valencia, Spain

2004
- "El Pecadero", Industria 33, Valencia, Spain
- "Lo que no se ve", La Sala Naranja, Valencia, Spain

2003
- "Arteuropa, Artistas Jóvenes de Europa", Centro Cultural Genaro Estrada de DIFOCUR, Culiacán, Mexico. Casa Ejidal Quilá II, Quilá, Mexico. Museo Regional del Valle del Fuerte, Los Mochis, Mexico. Centro Cultural Difocur-Badiraguato, Badiraguato, Mexico

2000
- "Intervención catártica", carretera Barcelona s/n, Valencia, Spain
- "Onda d’Urto, gli artisti siciliani under 35", Museo-albergo Atelier sul Mare, Castel di Tusa, Messina, Italy
- "Intertecno 2000", Feria de Valencia, Valencia, Spain
- "Teoria del fracaso visual", Sala Polivalente, Valencia, Spain

1999
- "Il Genio di Palermo, studi aperti degli artisti", Palermo di scena, Palermo, Italy
- "Art charnel, storie di corpi non addomesticali", Chiesa delle Balate, Palermo, Italy
- "FE99", MIFAV, Universitá di Roma Tor Vergata, Rome, Italy

1998
- "Nowork", Centro Culturale Polivalente Agricantus, Palermo, Italy. Fuerte del Rapitán, Jaca, Spain
- "Osservatorio Sud", Saletta AcaB, Catania, Italy

1997
- "Corpo Unico", Laboratori Riuniti, Palermo, Italy
- "L’Immagine Leggera", Magazzini ferroviari ai Lolli, Palermo, Italy

Collections

Fundación Bancaja, Valencia, Spain
MIFAV, Universitá di Roma Tor Vergata, Rome, Italy
Filmoteca Regionale Siciliana, Palermo, Italy
Private Collections in Spain, Italy, Germany and United Kingdom

Bibliography

(Selection)

- Transfer Lounge, Calle 20 #41, September 2009
- Emilia Valenza, Il Presente? Meglio Schivarlo, Giornale di Sicilia, 1 may 2009
- Donato Faruolo, A compass needle for our starry universe (Un ago di bussola per il nostro universo stellato), TribeArt, may 2009
- Beautiful Freak (La Belleza de la Diferencia), Las Provincias, 7 mar. 2009
- Nueva exposición en Forja Arte Contemporáneo, Beautiful Freak (La Belleza de la Diferencia), El Mundo, 5 mar. 2009
- Forja Arte Contemporáneo acoge la muestra "Beautiful Freak", Levante, 4 mar. 2009
- Beautiful Freak, La belleza de la diferencia, catalogue. 2009
- Beautiful Freak, La belleza de la diferencia, brochure. 2009
- Ángela Sánchez de Vera, La triste muerte de Luther Blisset, Reenvio#0, oct. 2008
- Sergio Zavattieri, Alargando el tiempo todo adquiere formas diferentes, Leica Fotografie International, mar. 2008
- Una situazione da seguire a Palermo, Arte e Critica Nº 53. 2007/2008
- Rafael Prats Rivelles, Helsinki y Ojos Negros, Levante, 3 jul. 2007
- Helga Marsala, Sergio Zavattieri, Non esistono soluzioni intere positive all'equazione, Exibart, 9 mar. 2007
- Sergio Zavattieri, Inside Italia, the living art magazine, Nº 31. 2007
- Giulia Ingarao, Il teorema pittorico di Sergio Zavattieri, Anteprima, Nº 2. 2007
- Sergio Zavattieri, Giornale di Sicilia, 9 feb. 2007
- Sergio Zavattieri, Leica Fotografie International, feb. 2007
- Giulia Ingarao, Panoramica sui nuovi appuntamenti della stagione nelle Gallerie di Palermo, Anteprima, Nº 1. 2006
- Armando Pilato, El Vidifestival06 muestra en Valencia las obras de más de 350 artistas de 16 países, Levante, 3 nov. 2006
- Vidifestival06, International Videoart Festival of Valencia, catalogue. 2006
- Critica a l'art de gènere polititzat , Levante, 4 apr. 2006
- Stefano Elena, Sergio Zavattieri, Beautiful Kollaps, catalogue. 2006
- Stefano Elena, Sergio Zavattieri, Fuorigioco, catalogue. 2006
- Stefano Elena, Sergio Zavattieri, About Botánica series, brochure. 2006
- Elise Desserne, Sergio Zavattieri, Plottart.europa, catalogue. 2005
- Treinta artistas transforman el Club Palyboy en sala de exposiciones temporal, Levante, 17 jun. 2005
- Carlos Aimeur, El club Playboy se viste de sala de exposiciones, El Mundo, 17 jun. 2005
- Complementos y Artificios, catalogue. 2005
- XXXII Premio Bancaja, catalogue. 2005
- Helga Marsala, About The Last Meal series, brochure. 2004
- Rosa Ulpiano, Sergio Zavattieri, Entre la ciencia y la estética, Levante, 5 nov. 2004
- Vulture, Magazine de creación masiva, Nº 8. 2004
- Rosa Ulpiano, Sergio Zavattieri, Rostros sin sentimiento, Levante, 21 feb. 2003
- Rosa Ulpiano, Sergio Zavattieri, Falso Movimiento (la catarsis de una nueva visión ontológica), catalogue. 2003
- Gerónimo Gerardo Guevara Vera, Arteuropa, Artistas Jóvenes de Europa, brochure. 2003
- Intertecno 2000, catalogue. 2000
- Gianna Di Piazza, Sergio Zavattieri, Art Charnel, storie di corpi non addomesticati, catalogue. 1999
- FE99, catalogue. 1999
- Sabina Spada, Buone nuove da Palermo, Tema Celeste Nº 76. 1999
- Paola Nicita, Arte giovane a Palermo, Flash Art Nº 214. 1999
- Paola Nicita, Sergio Zavattieri, Genio di Palermo '99, studi aperti degli artisti, catalogue. 1999
- Paola Nicita, Giovani artisti in cd-rom, Oggi Sicilia, 26 gen. 1999
- Paola Nicita, Con "Nowork" un collettivo di giovani artisti palermitani, Oggi Sicilia, 28 dec. 1998
- L'immagine leggera, festival internazionale di videoarte II edizione, catalogue. 1997

Links

www.sergiozavattieri.com

Sergio Zavattieri

ZELLE ARTE CONTEMPORANEA
Via Matteo Bonello n°19 / Via Fastuca n°2
90134 Palermo
Italy

zelle@zelle.it
www.zelle.it