Retrospective London Biennale 2004 at Studio.ra
Curated by Raffaella Losapio and inauguration of Studio.ra, Rome
Download: articolo London Biennale -su Flash Art_n.221_aprile-maggio_2.000
LB 2004 performances – Videos by Arvinder Bawa
LB 2004 Photos and Museum MAN photos by Arvinder Bawa
Artistic Shoes ‘Searching for Cinderella’ by Marisol Cavia
Cart Blanche – Check In exhibition – Lucia Cipriano
Marisol Cavia, Lucia Cipriano & I spent a weekend in Rome, for three days of intense activity, during which we participated in the Inaugural exhibition of the newly opened studio.ra gallery owned by Raffaella Losapio.
Firstly a major thank you to Raffaella for meeting us at the airport in Rome, taking care of our needs during the weekend, including excellent dinners based on family recipes on the terrace of her house from where we could enjoy the delightful views of the Rome landmarks such as the Coliseum etc.
We set up the exhibition on the friday which included the projection arrangements for the DVDs of several LB 2004 events, including Katie’s Long Shore drift at Brighton Beach, Jill’s All for Love Brompton Cemetery event, Marisol’s Eros Arrows events at the Foundry, and David’s 6000 Chairs event at Crystal Palace. The whole series of videos were projected during the entire evening of Saturday and Sunday and the audience really enjoyed the performances, asked a lot of questions (in Italian mostly which we were just about able to answer using English, Spanish and French words!)
There was also a display of Marisol Cavia’s ‘In search of Cindarella’ shoes which graced the entrance hall, and proved popular with the visitors.
On the first floor up a short flight of stairs there was the instalation of the Cart Blanche gallery of Lucia Cipriano, which provided a continuous dialogue with the visitors, including the ‘escambio’ exchange negotiations by Lucia, which will be seen by the LBAs at various exhibitions in London this summer.
There were also several photographs on display from my collection, depicting many LBA performances and the scenes from my visit to the MuseumMAN site in Liverpool.
Among the well wishers for the success of the Gallery in Rome were Reynolds, Rosemary Lopes, Adam Nankervis and David Medalla. In Italy Vincenzo Ceccato, Antonio Sassu, Elena Polidori and Filippo Ceccarelli attended or sent their best wishes. We also made new contacts and several possibilities of collaboration with art groups in Italy are on the table. The videos of the LB events have been requested by an art group in Sardinia for projections later this year.
A dance by two butterflies was performed in the Piazza San Giovanni in front of Marisol & I as we walked to Raffaella’s apartment and this led to the idea of reenacting the Butterfly Dance first performed by David in Rome. Two performances were carried out, the first by Raffaella in a garden in the city centre where David performed, and the second by Raffaella, Lucia, Marisol and a visiting artist at the Studio.
In between Raffaella made sure that we did some sight seeing, visited the studios of several Rome Artists and had a generally good time.
Once again a big thank you to Raffaella, her family Tina, Marco, Elena, Paolo, for extending their hospitality to the London Biennale, and we wish her new gallery studio.ra in Rome every success.
Regards,
Arvinder
