The Blank, on occasion of the 35th edition of Bergamo Film Meeting, presents a retrospective dedicated to Franco Vaccari’s video.

On Saturday, 11 March, at the Cinema San Marco, a selection of the artist’s video will be presented. Franco Vaccari personally introduces his own works to the public in an open meeting.
The entrance is free.

The retrospective starts from Nei Sotterranei (1966-67), where the images of walls of bathrooms and basements littered with graffiti assume the meaning of anonymous poetry and find a filmic equivalent in the artist’s early experiments with visual poetry. Then, there is Cani Lenti (1971), accompanied by a soundtrack taken from a Pink Floyd song, in which the act to follow and film some stray dogs highlights the different reactions of the animals in contact with the camera, showing how the observation disrupts the subject. La via Emilia è un aeroporto (2000) offers a cross section of the life of the inhabitants of Via Emilia: from the houses of people watching TV, Vaccari goes to interact with the local prostitutes, and then dwells on images of model airplanes installed along the road that allude to the desire of evasion of the inhabitants. Provvista di ricordi per il tempo dell’Alzheimer (2003) closes the exhibition; here the artist, imagining suffering from Alzheimer’s, draws from personal photos to make video memories that lose last.

The event is organized with the support of the P420 gallery (Bologna).

The Blank is pleased to present, on occasion of the 35th edition of Bergamo Film Meeting, an appointment dedicated to Franco Vaccari: Esposizione in tempo reale N. 45.

On Friday, 10 March, the artist will pay homage to the city of Bergamo with the unreleased video environmental installation Esposizione in tempo reale N.45 at the Sala alla Porta Sant’Agostino and placing outside Il Mendicante Elettronico.
For Esposizione in tempo reale N.45, Franco Vaccari has invited some of Bergamo artists to create sculptures-bed in front of the projection of his video Buona Notte, shelters in which to rest and dream.
The artists involved in creating the beds are: Davide Allieri, Cinzia Benigni, Filippo Berta, DZT collective, Oscar Giaconia, Daniele Maffeis, Andrea Mastrovito, Giovanni Oberti, Francesco Pedrini, Maria Francesca Tassi.

For the inauguration at Porta Sant’Agostino, the space will host the “repose” of the artists and several cultural figures throughout the night.

The event is organized with the support of the P420 gallery (Bologna).

The 35th edition of Bergamo Film Meeting will take place from March 11 to 19, 2017 in Bergamo.
A rich and varied program is in the works, which confirms the Festival’s constant and ongoing effort in research and in creating connections between the most innovative trends in contemporary cinema and styles, genres and authors from the past.
Tributes, retrospectives, and restorations of classic masterpieces counterpoint the works of “new authors” which, as usual, are featured in the Competition- Exhibition and the sections of the festival dedicated to documentaries, animation, and previews. Supported and promoted by the European Union through the Creative Europe MEDIA program, the Festival explores the cinematography of the continent between past and present, offering ideas, suggestions, new perspectives and interpretations.
For nine days, with over 140 movies – including shorts and feature films – Bergamo Film Meeting will be the crossroads of international cinema, featuring guests, meetings, special events, live scoring, exhibitions, workshops, master classes, guided screenings for schools and children, and many other initiatives which – thanks to the contribution of partners and institutions – will allow the audience to explore the endless contaminations between movies, visual arts, literature, music, and comics.

ART UP 3/17 – CHANTAL JOFFE
curated by Enrico De Pascale

Depressed Earth
The older you get, the more life becomes miserable, all the people you grow up with die, your parents die, your grandparents die, your dog dies, your energy diminishes, there’s less books to read, there’s no more groups to discover, you just end up a barren wasteland, trying to discover something new, which never really occurs. You end finding worth in groups which 2 or 3 years ago you would have spat on, which I do all the time, its depressing, I mean, I am getting into Buffalo Springfield, which is a nightmare.
Richey Edwards

Beneath the Silures’ feet the Carboniferous swamps, mud, sediment and organic matter, compressed over millions of years, turned into high quality anthracite coal. This valuable dark artery runs serpentine from Spain under the Bay of Biscay to Britain and across the Atlantic to Pennsylvania. The subterranean horizontal passage of solidified carbon sludge is an ominous harbinger of the tumultuous binds that link the peoples and the social institutions born out of its exploitation. On the golden sands of Langland Bay, 2,500 years ago… a Silurian child is building sand castles and knocking them down.