Friday 30th of June - 19:00h
Yervant Gianikian (Merano, 1942) and Angela Ricci Lucchi (Rome, 1942-2018) are two essential Italian artists in avant-garde cinema. Their work is based on compilation films and film installations about the great wars of the 20th century and the ideologies that produced them. This programme is a retrospective on the theme of war catastrophe as a central theme, and includes the international premiere of his latest film, Facing Guernica (2023).
The artists present at the exposition Maquinaciones the installation Frente a Guernica, which consists of a selection of watercolours by Angela Ricci Lucchi, manifesto-posters and a looped projection of the artists' latest film of the same name, commissioned by the Museo Reina Sofía. The film has its origins in the last script written by the two artists - after their visit to the Museum in 2014 to present the film Pays barbare [Barbarian Country, 2014] - influenced by the new museography around Picasso's Guernica in the context of the Civil War. After Ricci Lucchi's death in 2018 and following the pandemic and extensive research in his vast film archive, Gianikian completed the commission in 2023: a new single-channel film conceived as a great historical fresco in which the mural is the symptom and sign of catastrophic times.
Curated by: Chema González