&

& is an exhibition by Stefano Calligaro, distributed as follows:

over one of Self Service Open Art Space’s walls, in Stuttgart;

over a desk in Sabot’s workroom, in Cluj;

over an A3 leaf, printed and distributed by Pond editions.

Dear Thorsten,

I know I’m a bit hermetic in my work, so I decided to share with you these lines about the idea behind the show, behind my personal poetic of &.

You know this morning we were talking about feedback, about what people would say or think about that small object taking the place of a show.
This is the starting point… My decision to present just one work in Selfservice, but two others somewhere else, comes from my interest in expectations. What do we expect from art today, from the artist, from words, from life, or just from ourselves?

An artwork is supposed to be charged mainly with visible values, easy to read, and it has mostly to be visible, big, possibly monumental and made by strong gestures; but what if art wants to be silent a bit?
What if the big gesture is there, hidden or hardly visible?

What I want from this show, from its display, is to keep the viewer suspended. He will be in Stuttgart, standing with a glass of beer in front of that piece, knowing, maybe, that another piece of the same show is somewhere in Cluj, and one more is printed somewhere on paper. The viewer can reach just one side of the show at a time. He is looking at one object only, while the rest of the show is remote. We could see it all, but to do so we should move away from &.

Same with the people in Cluj. They will see one piece as well, smaller, on a desk, by chance. The one who will receive the printed paper by mail will see only one side too… How to experience the whole thing then?

This might be the center of my poetic: how do we relate to objects? What if you are pushed to relate yourself to a singular piece at a time? Focus, or go.

I think my work is just this: private poetics aside. I put out something in the world; no matter how big or how small, I want the viewer to look at that thing for what it is, with no prejudice, no written references. In our case, I want him to stand in front of the & and feel in need to ask which is the relation between himself and my question mark.

Stefano