It starts again on July 18, with the exhibition INHUME at the Castle of Barletta, the CONTEMPORARY CIRCUIT, project with which the Puglia region, In collaboration with the Pugliese Public Theater e the artistic direction of the art historian Giusy Caroppo, stands there'goal of establishing a permanent network of excellence for the production and use of contemporary art.
The INHUMAN exhibition, edited by the artistic director and author of the Circuit Giusy Caroppo, distributed in all the rooms of the basement of the manor, wants to solicit reflection on the universality of human degradation, of the violence exercised by the individual or by power against the dignity of the person and his freedoms, also in light of the lockdown imposed by the pandemic and by the global protests to protect ethnic differences, touching the moral and anthropological sphere.
Beyond history, latitudes, age, gender and religion, so much so as to demonstrate how "inhumanity" is, in fact, “one of the characteristic qualities of the human being” as Ambrose Bierce already affirmed in the nineteenth century.
The concept is declined through site specific interventions and works characterizing some historical series of three international artists: kendell geers (Johannesburg-South Africa, 1960. Lives in Brussels), Oleg Kulik (Kiev, 1961) and Andres serrano (New York City, 1950).
kendell geersBorn into a working-class white Afrikaans family during the apartheid era, he embraced the anti-apartheid movement as a boy. In INHUMAN, through various media – neon, acrylic works, new or reinvented sculptures – he expresses his commitment as a militant artist aimed at unmasking any abuse of power and rediscovering a new spirituality. Along the itinerary, centered on a close dialogue with the works of Oleg Kulik, Geers intervenes with installations that concentrate the use of force in the sculptural message; central, in a non-dogmatic but symbolic vision, is above all the Christian or animist religious symbol and the choice to communicate to the public also through the more direct use of the word.
The story is intertwined with the contributions – including photography, video and site specific installations – of the Russian Oleg Kulik, visual artist, performer and political activist in favor of the protection of the environment and animal species. From historical and visionary performances witnessed by video installations, to those more closely connected to his symbiosis with the animal world, impersonating the "dog man", in an examination of extreme and claustrophobic situations praising freedom, up to messages against false morals, the violence of wars, the experiments against living beings, veiled by the poetry of images and dreamlike atmospheres.
Almost off limits due to the explicit force of the images - even more significant in a historical moment in which the world seems to have stopped, forgetting that physical violence and the denial of individual freedom and dignity is still alive and overbearing - is the sequence of eight works selected from the "Torture" series by Andres serrano, built in 2015 and exhibited en bloc in one of the gun halls of the Castle. Three men whose identity is denied but whose names and surnames we know live there, Fatima who “was Imprisoned and Tortured in Sudan”, anonymous torture victims hooded, bloodied, kneeling and forced to hold up unnatural and extreme positions, to close with the essence of the absence of air, summed up by the emblematic narrow and long interior of the Buchenwald security prison.
The exhibition, organized by the Pugliese Public Theater, was also realized thanks to the contribution of the Municipality of Barletta and the collaboration of the artists and - respectively - for Kendell Geeers of a/political, London and the collaboration of Becky Haghpanah-Shirwan, Sylwia Serafinowicz, Cendrine at du Welz; for Oleg Kulik of the Giampaolo Abbondio Gallery in Milan; for Andres Serrano of the Alfonso Artiaco Gallery in Naples.
The Circuito del Contemporaneo in Puglia, format conceived by the artistic director Giusy Caroppo, in the Strategic Plan of Culture for Puglia 2017-2025 "PIIIL", is a project implemented in line with the Project "Enhancement of culture and territorial creativity" - The system music in Puglia in the context of FSC Puglia 2014-2020, Pact for Puglia, Intervention Area IV "Tourism, Culture and enhancement of natural resources".
At the same time as the "Inhuman" exhibition, other widespread initiatives will be organized, in dialogue with institutions of national and international importance and other Municipalities of Puglia, in view of the establishment of "Territorial integrated poles of arts and culture", with a view to distributing activities in each of the six regional areas of tourist importance.
