Davvero intangibile, Really intangible

Ikon collaborates with a.topos Venice to present new and recent video and sculptural works by Italian artist Alice Cattaneo.

One of the most distinct voices in contemporary art, Cattaneo’s work is as subtle as it is no-nonsense, as smart as it is serious and as formal as it is easy-going. The artist has recently been working in Venice, making glass sculptures that draw from ancient tradition while conveying a here and now fragility. Cattaneo explains: “The work originates from the encounter of two parallel dimensions: the image that originates before the sculpture and the material that suggests a gesture. In this way, through materials, the original image becomes thought.” So the correspondence between the process for blown glass and the idea of inspiration becomes apparent.

The continuity of everyday life and artistic experience is crucial to Cattaneo’s proposition, and her video pieces are short, often snatches of observation, like epiphanies, that are beautiful in their revelations, especially about the way we navigate the object world.

This exhibition constitutes the artist’s response to a particular space, a.topos Venice and its location, not only through the placement of existing works, but also through a site-specific installation involving “found Murano materials”. Their translation into artistic circumstances, with the transparent brittleness of glass, and everything it symbolises, is typical of Cattaneo’s sensibility.

Exhibition organised by Ikon Gallery, Birmingham, UK and a.topos Curatorial Collective, Venice, Italy. Special thanks to Idea Murano Srl and Nicola Moretti.