Salto nel vuoto: the review o the GAMeC exhibition in Bergamo

An exhibition in three sections

An intertwining of complementary although different languages and materials, Jump into the Void is a visual and bodily experience and is divided into three thematic sections Void, Flow and Simulation.

The Emptiness as an investigation undertaken by the first movements of the historical avant-garde and then developed by the experimental groups after the Second World War. The Flow dating back to the years of the first computerization. Finally, the new languages and simulated realities in the post-digital age.

The title of the exhibition and the Empty section

The title refers to a famous performance by Yves Klein in 1960 which portrays the artist as he throws himself into the void from the ledge of a house in the street in Paris, clearly a photomontage.

However, it also partly refers to the exhibition of Klein Le Vide (The Void) at the Gallery Iris Clert in Paris. An exhibition with nothing, in which the gallery had been completely painted white.

The Empty section begins with this homage to white and to the white square by Kazimir Malevich who is the great absentee (in addition to Yves Klein whose reference is present only in the title) of this exhibition which we are talking about absence.

The first rooms bring together works from the 60s and 70s, mainly Italian authors, but not only, the experiences of Agostino Bonalumi and Enrico Castellani, the perforated transparent plastic sheets of Dadamaino, the minimalist compositions of Jean Degottex and Aiko Miyawaki up to the experiments with light and space of Ann Veronica Janssens.

The Flow section

The second section Flow focuses more directly on the information and software paradigm and how it has transformed contemporary society and the condition of existence of works of art and culture.

Flusso is also the largest section of the exhibition, a historical itinerary that has very precise stages in the birth of programmed art. Not to be overlooked is the section dedicated to the work of the Fluxus movement which reaches up to the present day.

The rooms host works by Giacomo Balla, Umberto Boccioni, František Kupka, Pablo Picasso; works by Agnes Martin to Roman Opałka, by Vera Molnar to Lillian F. Schwartz.

In each room an open dialogue, as if to mirror or contaminate each other, of works from the early and late twentieth century (which have nothing technological about them, but which come to terms with an evolving reality) with recent works by international artists.

The Simulation section

In the Simulation section, the experience of virtual reality and augmented reality beyond borders, a junction between real and virtual, with works that can be enjoyed; new worlds shaped through computer codes.

Great changes are taking place in the perception of the material, bodily and spiritual dimension.

From Rebecca Allen to John Gerrard, from Jon Rafman to TimurSi-Qin. MSHR (Brenna Murphy and Birch Cooper) present a new installation from the Nested Landscapes series.

Involvement is also given by the possibility of visualizing the experience that the user of virtual reality has in physical space.

He emerges with a broader and better structured vision (a term in apparent contradiction with the themes enucleated by the exhibition) of the process of contemporary accomplishment of the art produced over the course of these 100 years.