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#3

MiArt and Beyond

15000 Lobbyists

Randomness = Chaos ?

Musichaosmos / Conduction

Quello Stupido Buco

CHAOS

MAY / JUN

E 2010

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EDITORIAL TEAM

DIRECTOR Kiki Sideris

CHIEF EDITOR Alix Doran

ART, CULTURE EDITOR Sonia Fanoni

SCREAMING & SCREENING EDITOR

Livia Andrea Piazza

PHOTOSPECTIVES EDITOR Stephanie Serra

UPSIDE DOWN, INTERACTION EDITORS

Stephanie SerraAlexandra Bode

COMMUNICATION Neri Bastiancich

Rosa PlijnaarLorenzo Tubertini

Konstantinos Vogiatzis

ARTWORKcover photo: Remy Amezcua

table of contents: Stephanie Serraplaylist: Kiki Sideris

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ISSUE #3Chaos

“You must have chaos within you to give birth to a dancing star.” - Friedrich Nietzsche

Chaos of art, culture, taste, exhibitions, sounds, politics… Different places, different forms, but still chaos. These are the themes of Bob magazine n°3 ‘Chaos’. Nietzsche was probably right about chaos. And I would add that we all like a bit of chaos, because without surprises and without a bit of the ‘unexpected’, life (and Bob maga-zine) just would not be the same! The theme was actually particularly suited for this issue as it has been slightly more chaotic than usual to put it all together! University and internships, holidays and chocolates, travels and unexpected delays… This is what we have had to deal with to be able to give you ‘Chaos’ on time. But here it is, and I hope you enjoy it! To add a bit of confusion to this chaotic issue, the Editor’s choice is actually an ar-ticle written in Italian. It didn’t seem appropriate to translate it, so I apologise to all of you who will be unable to understand it.

- Alix Doran CHIEF EDITOR

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SOUNDTRACKChaotic

by Kiki Sideris

ARTMiArt and Beyond

by Giovanni Saladino

Pleasures of Chaosby Elisa Bramati

OUR PHOTOSPECTIVESLook for the sense in things

by Stephanie Serra

CULTURE15000 Lobbyists

by Emanuele Bompan

De Gustibus Non Disputandum Estby Chiara Valentini

CONTENTS

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UPSIDE DOWNBrisbane vs. Milanby Alix Doran andKiki Sideris

INTERACTIONRandomness = Chaos? : An interview of dancer Solenne Mascre'by Stephanie Serra

YOUR PHOTOSPECTIVESby various contributors

SCREAMING & SCREENINGMusichaosmos/ Conductionby Gabriele Marino

EDITOR'S CHOICEQuello Stupido Bucoby Tommaso Magistrelli

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INSTRUCTIONS FOR USE: Before reading this issue

1. Relax2. Read over the following tracks3. Look for them online/offline and compile a playlist or just go on BOB's YouTube channel and look for the 'cha-os' playlist4. Press play 5. Turn the page and6. Enjoy the newest issue of BOB accom-panied by a chaotic soundtrack

7 by Kiki Sideris

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ART

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We are continuously being ex-posed to all kinds of art prod-ucts; collections, exhibitions, fairs, biennials, conferences, and the list goes on. But what do such experiences really give us? How can we avoid just be-ing passive users and instead adopt a more inquisitive ap-proach? Books, academic jour-nals, and university lectures can help, but ultimately the most powerful tool we hold, is our individual ability to pro-cess the images that invade our field of vision on a daily basis. A

RT

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MIART

AND

BE-YOND

This year we had the 15th edition of MIART, the mod-ern and contemporary art fair of Milan, and after 5 years of living here, I decided to be part of this event for the first time. I'm talking about an event because MIART is not just an art fair, but is series of different things:

1. An exhibition at the PAC (contemporary art pavil-ion), curated by Giacinto di Pietrantonio and Fran-cesco Garutti and set-up with artworks taken from the galleries.

2. A series of conferences, with all the protagonists of the contemporary art scene in Milan

3. A magazine created in collaboration with Mousse Publishing (the free magazine that is also a publishing company)

4. A catalogue managed by another curator, Giorgio Verzotti, that includes a cultural and historical sec-tion.

For three days I tried to follow this tour, to stay on this merry-go-round, but it was neither funny nor inter-esting, as I had thought it might be. The feeling is that once again the organizers bet more on quantity than on quality.

The first stage is the exhibition at the PAC, ibrido. Ge-netica delle forme. It is a collection of works taken from the warehouse of the participating galleries, put togeth-er under the big umbrella of the hybrid concept; a recep-tacle of different theories and visions, from exhibitions such as Post-human (made by Jeffrey Deitch almost 20 years ago) and Sensation ( '97, Royal Academy of Art) to the post-production theory of Bourriaud and the concept of open artwork of Umberto Eco. Certainly there are nice things to see, for instance the video “After Empire” made by Elodie Pong, in which the icons of the last century are transfigured with irony (Marilyn Monroe flirting with Carl Marx, Pinocchio snorting glue, etc), or Pistoletto’s “love differences”, a table with the shape of the Mediterranean sea surrounded by chairs of different style. There are im-portant artists, but the whole thing turns into a jumble of rooms set up approximately, in a tiresome way. Up-stairs, there is a very interesting selection of videos, but some of them keep on repeating several times, others never appear, and the audios overlap each-other. It is a mess, a chaos, and definitely a pity.

The second stage of the tour is at Milano Fiera city, where the fair itself takes place. The first impression is a sort of déjà-vu, because of some artworks already exhib-ited at the PAC (which and how many interests are behind this transaction?). The stands are quite big compared to other art fairs, like the ones in Torino and Bologna (prob-ably are cheaper). Almost all the galleries of Milan are

by Giovanni Saladino

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presents, some others are from the rest of Italy. There is nearly nothing from abroad. The conferences, organized in collaboration with the IULM university and curated by Milovan Farronato, are on the usual topics. The one I try to follow is almost deserted and quite boring, the entire environment results too dispersive and the atmosphere absolutely not stimulating.

In spite of the optimistic press reviews and reports on TV, MIART is still a provincial art fair. All the protago-nists of the contemporary art scene in Milan are present, but all of them look quite bored.

Everybody wants to participate, from the most influ-ential galleries to the underground initiatives, and this could be a good sign, but they are still not able to fo-cus their energies in the same direction. Compared with other events that animate Milan during the year, like the Salone del Mobile or the several fashion weeks, MIART is not able to create a buzz around the city. The collateral events have little resonance, and people are not really involved.

It seems clear enough that there are strong waves of influence and big games of power behind all this. Maybe the concept of fair is not the best pillar to build a demo-cratic system. For sure it is not enough to involve all the usual players, but Milan is a city that is demonstrating

(Sanna Marander, from the art fair)

its needs, its wishes to create groups (from Start Milano, the association of galleries, to the Twister Circuit that put together 10 museums all around Lombardy).

My personal hope is that, in the middle of this chaos, in this overlapping of interests and roles, the underground initiatives and the small experimental experiences (in Milan we have several alternative spaces) will become more and more important, generating fresh energies inside a monotonous circuit. By receiving a recognition at an institutional level, those spaces could become ac-tive centers for the production and promotion of culture; free from hidden interests, and be the new pillars of a new system, less glittering but more transparent and democratic.

Giovanni Saladino is completing his MSc in Arts Management at Boc-coni University. He is a regular contributor and a former editor of BOB. He is currently on exchange at the IUAV in Venice. He has collaborated on various contemporary art projects in Milan, Palermo and Venice. His most recent endeavor (in collaboration with Nicole Moserle and Ryts Monet) is OMOVA, the outdook museum of Venetian art (http://omova.wordpress.com/).

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The limits of the human mind are constantly pushed further as technology, tolerance, and talent are investi-gated and pursued as valuable objectives in our present society. Globalisation has undoubtedly made this pro-cess faster, making us confident with, and persistently exposed to, new cultures and traditions, which we have to synthesise, individually and collectively, as part of our everyday living experience.

This does not always happen without difficulties. On the contrary. The world shows us a variety of attempts failing, episodes of confrontation where cultures system-atically clash rather than blend, generating a displacing

sense of chaos. As a growing multicultural city, Milan has to deal with these issues like no other place in our country, a price it has to pay for pursuing its dream of international recognition. But as soon as we (think we) get used to the last wave of Chinese, Indian or South American culture - I’m being ironically inaccurate - a newcomer, hidden behind the hype of its waking econ-omy, pervades the media as much as our urban morn-ing encounters: Indonesia. This country, an archipelago of little scattered islands, is populated by over 230 mil-lion people and is home to the largest Muslim commu-nity in the world. With such figures, it‘s no surprise that

PLEASURES OF CHAOSby Elisa Bramati

Fool in Love by Agus Suwage, 2009. (www.primomarellagallery.com)

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by Elisa Bramati

Elisa Bramati is a Bocconi University Alumna and an Asian art fanatic. She earned her MSc in Arts Management last year with a thesis on the effects of the crisis on the contem-porary art market in Asia. She is currently working in Ven-ice but would love to stay in touch with the ACME world!

something relevant is going on at the cultural level down there. What is less easy to imagine is how Milan can rec-ognise this phenomenon with the same rapidity as the top artistic centres in the world. If the city is succeeding in doing so, it is thanks to a small number of pioneers that, working together and in collaboration with interna-tional curators and dealers, brought to the West the first relevant and comprehensive exhibition entirely dedicat-ed to Contemporary Indonesian Art.

“Pleasures of Chaos” opened in January at the Primo Marella Gallery and made a statement for itself. Stepping in the large white space of the gallery, visitors could find themselves gently surrounded by a colourful collection of paintings and installations representing landscapes and portraits, cartoon heroes and babies, all pleasant and cheering at first sight. However, what seemed so fa-miliar at the beginning was soon replaced by some sort of horror, soothed by irony and fun. More than that, after an accurate exploration, an expert eye could recognise clear quotations from important Western artists, includ-ing Marina Abramović and Maurizio Cattelan. Among well-known and emerging names, Entang Wiharso, Rudi Mantofani, Haris Purnomo and Wayan Suja, just to name a few; the most outstanding work, chosen to represent the whole event, was “Fool in Love” by Agus Suwage. This installation is not only a new milestone in the Indonesian panorama, but surprisingly has also a very strong con-nection with Milan and our artistic scene. With a pair of Mickey Mouse ears, a black graphite and polyester skel-eton hangs on the wall, suspended by layers of scotch-tape, just like at the performance “A Perfect Day” made by Cattelan in 1999. On that occasion, the Italian artist had hung no less a person than Massimo De Carlo, the gallery owner who hosted his exhibition, transferring the traditional debate on the relationship with the artwork from the artist to the dealer. With “Fool in Love”, on the opposite, Suwage pushed the artistic discourse to a fur-ther level, introducing the debate about contemporary Indonesian culture and the source of its influences. This issue, observed by him in very ironic and sarcastic tones, becomes a crucial point even in the other works in the exhibition. As the renowned curator Jim Supangkat ex-plains in his critical essay, these artists “reveal the con-text of the contemporary art in Indonesia, which is the modern life that displays signs of disorder. In Indonesia, the modern system and structure go on an automatic mode and are more or less soul-less. The understand-ing of the modern concepts relies merely on an imposed blue print of the modern world and is not based on em-pirical experience. In reality, as these modern concepts are applied, a range of contradictions arise, reflecting the clashes of orders because the blue print of the mod-ern world provides no space for the internal dynamics of the local culture. There is a clash between the systematic and well-structured outer order and the unidentified in-

ner order”. Supangkat portrays a reality in which a new artistic movement, called the New Art Movement, chal-lenges the depoliticisation of art and all the modernist tendencies emerged during the New Order, when the regime of general Suharto led artists to back off from present social issues and realism in favour of an inves-tigation of Indonesia pre-colonial origins. In this view, the Movement began to contrast the quest for ethnicity, often misunderstood and stereotyped by international curators, opposing the concept of a common identity brought by globalization. Mickey Mouse and superhe-roes features, then, paved the way for a more insight-ful appropriation of a western imagery, constantly used and readapted to create chaotic outputs and interesting meanings. Supangkat reads the contemporary disorder, as seen by these artists, through the lens of the theory of entropy, according to which “the condition of disorder is a fundamental issue in everything, just as order is”. They celebrate chaos with irony and freshness, without imagining any alternative order that could never be per-manently stable anyway. To strengthen their message, they also adopt elements from the most displacing kind of western art, the one that still has to be consecrated and universally accepted, just like Cattelan’s.

Given the level of involvement of its culture and art in this process of comparison, Milan is called to partake in the debate between East and West, between national and foreign identity at large, like it has never done before. This exhibition, as much as other similar cultural initia-tives, could be the first step away from a too narrow per-spective, still quite focused on the Italian and European artistic panorama. Enhancing the awareness of unfamil-iar cultures and their creative scenes could bring our country to the same level as the most tolerant societies, improving the quality of our life in the urban context.

A series of exhibitions of Iranian, Uzbek and Lithu-anian artists, among others, are scheduled for the next months in Milan. This might be a good chance to reflect on our differences and possible unfounded prejudices, in order to create a more solid base of understanding and find our way in the present cultural chaos.

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PHOTOSPECTIVES

This is not a professional photographical output, but a place to merge subjective points of view to build a more objective one. So Be Objective! Look

around. Images everywhere. We take pictures, we share them, exchange them, stock them, look at them, forget about them and pull them out of an

old drawer to reminisce. In the era of digitalization, photography has become a new game where the objective can be pointed at anything, from the

most serious to the most futile subject. The freedom of a quick “click” is sometimes abused so choices have to be made in order for the images to

start interacting and, by speaking a common language, build a common sense. First, in OUR PHOTOSPECTIVES, we will have a look at this issue's theme

through the lense of BOB's photo editor. Then (pgs 44-53 ) we will experience the theme through a selection of images submitted by YOU, the readers...

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This is not a professional photographical output, but a place to merge subjective points of view to build a more objective one. So Be Objective! Look

around. Images everywhere. We take pictures, we share them, exchange them, stock them, look at them, forget about them and pull them out of an

old drawer to reminisce. In the era of digitalization, photography has become a new game where the objective can be pointed at anything, from the

most serious to the most futile subject. The freedom of a quick “click” is sometimes abused so choices have to be made in order for the images to

start interacting and, by speaking a common language, build a common sense. First, in OUR PHOTOSPECTIVES, we will have a look at this issue's theme

through the lense of BOB's photo editor. Then (pgs 44-53 ) we will experience the theme through a selection of images submitted by YOU, the readers...

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look for the

sense in

things

photos by: Stephanie Serralocation: Istanbul

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CU

L-TU

RE

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CU

L-TU

RE

Sometimes we take culture for granted. People, history, traditions, dialogues, heritage. Other times, in-stead, an analytical thought cross-es our minds and we stop and re-flect. Be Objective magazine offers this particular space to just such reflections; entering our everyday lives in order to offer a glimpse into some common cultural en-counters: trips we went on, food we ate, urban centers we visited, old traditions we rediscovered, senses of fashion we express, and so on.

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15000 lobbyists. That’s what private interest and public in-terest has dislocated in DC. An army. Overpaid, over-load by alcohol, unknown faces that drive the most powerful – and declining economy in the world.

Every group, corpo-ration, NGO, religion confession, think tank has a representative on the Hill to promote their interests in US poli-tics. They support laws, amendments, earmarks in exchange for votes, lobbying efforts, and campaign money. It’s all legal. Just visit openSe-crects.org to see the list of ev-ery single campaign support received by the House, the Sen-ate, the White house candidates. It’s easy to track, there’s a public record of all the registered lobby-ists. Yet, it is the most chaotic power super network in the world. Brian M, a lobbyist, invited me to be with him for 24 hours on the hard line of k-street people. Where politics are made, where p u b -lic and private interests collide.

K is where most of the lobbies’ offices are located, conveniently between government buildings, hotels, and the Congress. Luxury buildings and Starbucks, Starbucks and luxury building. Every network has hubs: for lobbyists, the hubs are K street, WH, and the Hill (which is itself a maze with underground tunnel special subway and more than 3000 rooms in 6 build-ings, plus the Capitol). Secondary hubs: Starbucks.

Caffeine is fuel, mixed with the power of thirstiness and class struggle. Add alcohols

and you get the fuel for 15000 lobbyists. “We have an average of three BlackBerry”, tells Brian.

Pure network philosophy. On the hill everyone is typ-ing on his/her BlackBerry. Sometimes soon they will all suffer thumbs carpal tunnel. “I receive 400 emails a day”. Which means that 6 million emails are sent every day to as much as 40.000 feds and representa-tive and staffers that potentially can send 12 million emails a day, averaging the astonishing amount of mail: 18milion.

Sometimes you even lose the sense of what you’re doing. They don’t even write those email, staffers and interns do that. Those people are pure political network. Moving, always on the go.

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15000 LOBBYISTSby Emanuele Bompan

Corridors, coffees. Meeting with com-mission A, Defense, Labour, Subcommit-tees on climate, finance. Take the underground metro that goes from the senate to Hart building. A multiplex network of extemporary interaction to share tidbits of information, rumors, in the cafete-ria, in the elevators. In the Congress dedalus, Brian orients himself easily, an expert explorer of the deep abyss of the dungeon. Any place is a place for a com-promise, an arrangement, achieving a small change in a law, or just small talks to upkeep relations. <We have spent 140 million once just to have an increase of 14% in a military spending> told an official lobby-ists, under secrecy.

Off the record restaurants, $32 for a juicy Steak, $10 for a Bloody Mary, and tons of congressman and

street people meeting with local officers. Sharing info on POTUS, on the government. Restaurants are another hub where politics are made. The best deals are made here, and Bloody Maries helps. At night, alcohol rules, with extemporary relationship. Dating as a strategy. Unknown faces that spend most of the day building networks, unable to cultivate social relationships. That’s why online dating web-sites spring in DC, struggling to be the most popular ready to satisfy the lonely lobbyists’ hearts. Mostly woman, this is not a men’s world. Unexpected, uh?

Hell is here between nice trees and imperial-style palaces, on a daily chaotic battle, where clear politics emerge, simple, black on white, for the daily survival of the United States of America, under the army of lobbyists.

Emanuele Bompan is cartographer, urban analyst and jour-nalist. He studied geography and territorial processes in Bologna, Jerusalem, UCLA in Los Angeles and Wisconsin University, Madison, USA. At the moment he is an Italian reporter from Capitol Hill.

http://www.wordle.net

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I’m in doubt.I wonder if, in a way, legitimacy and truthfulness of

subjective judgments are going towards a certain exas-peration.

If I think about art, I have the perception that an ex-treme evolution of subjectivism is causing a bit of cha-os.

The common saying De gustibus non disputandum est, although it is partially true, is allowing some ‘pos-sibilities’ that maybe shouldn’t exist. Nowadays in art we don’t have “rules” and “standards” anymore, which can direct our judgments, therefore saying and doing everything is allowed because subjectivism has become a sufficient condition to recognize the quality. “Saying and doing everything” means for me the legitimacy of considering art whatever you want, whether if you do art and or if you observe it.

The criticism to De gustibus non disputandum est springs out from the conviction that recognizing the va-lidity of artworks should be possible, regardless of our personal taste for which we consider them “beautiful” or “ugly”. I believe that the subjectivism of taste isn’t an appropriate and sufficient way to judge the “quality” of works. So if we want to have valuable and solid opinions (I don’t want to enter into the illusory field of truth) we should clarify, before asserting something, those terms that we use to judge our work and the one of others.

ART, BEAUTY, CREATIVITY are concepts that mostly conduct us to express opinions about art, therefore a bit of precision about them is probably necessary. Al-though, when we use them, a certain level of compre-hension seems to exist among us, when we try to answer the questions “what is art? What is beauty? What is cre-ativity?” it becomes impossible. To have an exhaustive definition seems a deed comparable to the Babel tower where everyone speaks a different language.

Consequently I would like this article to be first of all a chance of tidying up a chaos that I feel.

by Chiara Valentini

Considering the present worse than a past that we gloomily miss is not in my intentions (how can we miss something which didn’t belong to us?); instead I would like to put some solid basis to have coherence between what we say and what we do.

In this reflection on concepts of Art, Beauty, and Cre-ativity I don’t want to start from the past, but from the present.

Museums of contemporary art have become one of the main parameters to judge cities; most important capitals (and not) seem to collect new museums. An example is Milan: in addition (support?) to the PAC two museums of contemporary art are expected, the museum of the Pres-ent in Bovisa area and the twisted museum by Libeskind for City Life.

I’m not absolutely against the spread of art, but some doubts arise when, visiting the “must-see museums” in many cities (such as the Pompidou in Paris), you can of-ten hear visitors expressing perplexed opinions about this contemporary art .

So, the criticisms are as inevitable as the “must-see museums”.

The concept of Art seems not to fit anymore to what is presented as art today. In fact if we consider the Venere of Botticelli, no one doubts it’s art, no one dares to say, but even dares to think, “I’m able to do it too!”; everyone agrees that the Venere is an artwork.

But what about some sculptures of Anish Kapoor? Can we surely say that his works, which remind visceral and excrementitious images, are art? I don’t believe that the percentage of agreements is equal to the one for the Venere.

This is a consequence of the fact that if Beauty is suf-ficient to say that the Venere is art, the same Beauty is useless to judge Kapoor. Then, this is the reason why we need the help of Creativity! Currently the widespread conviction is that if a work is new, never seen, amazing (in a positive or negative way) it is surely art. But, are we sure? I am not so sure.

This doesn’t want to be an apologia of a pre-romantic concept of art reassuring and objective, but also “limited” because it excludes, for art, the possibility of arousing different emotions by the aesthetic pleasure; instead this would be an attempt to precise those new catego-

“La nascita di Venere”, Sandro Botticelli, 1485, Galleria degli Uffizi

DE GUSTIBUS NON DISPUTANDUM EST

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Chiara Valentini was born in Milan and is studying architecture (4th year) at the Politecnico. She has ideated (with Fabio Marini) a blog www.kasaweb.wordpress.com where they write about architecture, but not only. The blog is the result of Chiara's interest to read and write in general -but especially about architecture-, it is an expression of a wish to work in the fields of architectural criticism, theory and history.

ries we need to judge and appreciate contemporary art.Well, Beauty isn’t exhaustive anymore for two reasons:

first of all the concept of Beauty has been transformed from objective – the beauty as a proportion of parts – to subjective – de gustibus non disputandum est –; then Beauty, losing its role of aim, has become a category totally useless for contemporary art.

Therefore the present subjectivism puts us in front of some difficulties; indeed, if the subjective Beauty can’t be considered an exhaustive parameter to understand and judge artworks, Creativity, even if it is probably more suitable to contemporary art, is submitted to the same subjectivism. So it doesn’t allow us to elaborate “sure” sentences because what is innovative and amaz-ing for an individual could be different for others.

From the moment every judgments have gained the same value as each other just because they are all sup-ported by subjectivity, I believe that the possibility for everyone to say what one wants, even if one doesn’t have the knowledge to do so, is a bit dangerous.

It’s dangerous because the risk is that everything can be art; art which frees itself by the practical skill of pro-duction, by the “ability of doing”, art which justifies it-self only with the intention, art which frees totally by its practical aspect, art which loses its matter and so arrives to a paradoxical point, art which arrives to its Hegelian death.

Many times I ask myself if some contemporary art-works are not understandable to us because of time. I have the doubt that maybe not enough time has passed for us to understand them, to make them ours.

Impressionism, Cubism, Fauvism, Surrealism and oth-er avant-garde movements at the moment of their ap-parition surely weren’t appreciated in a way comparable to the success obtained after decades. Could the same thought be valid for contemporary art? I don’t have an irrefutable answer.

In my opinion, a valid contemporary art exists, an art that provokes reflections, an art which demonstrates to have solved enormous problems in the conceptual and material spheres. But, on the other hand, I can’t deny that sometimes I remain totally astonished in front of some artworks, I doubt about their value and, even if I do have some notions, I’m not able to appreciate them.

In the past I have tried to find some “sure” parame-ters which could guide me in the judgment of art, which should be for everyone, which should give something to us not necessarily by culture. But then I realized that this research is completely vain. The reassuring Beauty and the perfect Imitation of reality can’t help us understand contemporary art, to judge it a lot depends on us.

I would like to thank a sculptor, Carl D’Alvia, who has been enlightening for me. He thinks that the only way to develop those “criterions” which enable us to express valid judgments free from personal taste is visiting gal-

leries and museums, getting in contact as much as pos-sible with art. Only in this way opinions can have a cer-tain “truth” because based on the knowledge and on the comparison. And after all, this is the same mechanism that we use when reading books and watching films; our opinions are stronger if they’re supported by associa-tions and comparisons, even if we aren’t graduated in literature or cinematography.

The turning-point in art happened between the 17th and the 18th century with the arrival of Romanticism and next avant-garde and it has carried many new possibili-ties for artists and for art-users. I think that the oppor-tunity of arousing and perceiving the sublime, anguish, anxiety, criticism, irony, ecstasy, disgust, indignation, is something very precious: it has permitted to go over fixed canons and to abolish the old academism based only on Beauty and Mimesis.

Nevertheless, this new situation implies more difficul-ties because to rely on sure “rules”, as sieve of our judg-ments, isn’t possible anymore.

I believe that the power of art-users to elaborate per-sonal conclusions should be preserved, as well as the artists’ power of “moving” something in us, not neces-sary with figurativity. But we must be careful because falling in the trap is so easy.

Our generation, instead of being afraid of a possible invasion by aliens, should worry about the one quietly done by photographers. They’re number is increasing excessively. The length of the camera seems to be in proportion with being artist. The possibility of having cameras which are easier to use than the past ones can’t be sufficient to compare who presses a button in an am-ateurish way (if the subject is nice the photo probably won’t be horrible), and who, before pressing that same bottom, did theoretical studies and worked a lot for a project.

What I want to say is that if we love Art we must save it with amateurism. “Everyone is an artist and everyone can do everything” is not real. We can’t judge art basing on the self-reference.

Taste, perceptions, and personal sensations aren’t enough to speak about Art, Beauty, and Creativity.

We can’t abolish the combination of Project and Abil-ity of doing that only permits the Art not to die.

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Cultural exchange is such an abused concept in our globalized age - We read, study and hear about it, of-ten in very theoretical ways. However, our personal experiences, those small episodes of exchange, of-ten go unnoticed. This section is dedicated to those who left, and those who came, those who turned their worlds upside down and agreed to tell us how they did it. This section is also an excuse to bring a lit-tle lightness to everyday life - We ask for your favourites, the best, the superlatives - never ask for less!

UPSIDE DOWN

Name: BraedanSurname: BeggsCountry of origin: AustraliaCurrent location: Milano, ItaliaReason for trip: Experience living in another country; living with new people from different cultures, searching for ac-comodation, organising travel etc...and, oh yeah, uni!Duration of stay: 1 semester (6 months)Countries visited in the past two years: France, Hungary, Austria, Poland, Czech Republic, Zimbabwe, Zambia, Mozambique...very soon I'm also visiting Spain and Morocco

What's the greatest difficulty you have had to face in your new surroundings? The language barrier, but only sometimesWhat is the first image that pops into your head when you hear the word chaos? RiotsThe most chaotic situation you have ever lived through? Riding a scooter through the streets of Bali, Indone-siaChaos or silence? ChaosWhat do you miss most from back home? The surf...I can chat to friends and family but i couldn't bring the surf with me to Italy!Special bar or spot in Milan? Parco Sempione...really want to have a BBQ there one warm weekend!Important newspaper/magazine in Milan? - Memorable song of 2009/2010: Phoenix - LisztomaniaMemorable moment: Tough question! All of them!

What would you like to know about the next upside down couple? List the Top 10 cities you've visited, Where are you going on your next trip?

Here are the questions the previous upside down couple would like you to answer:

Do you feel that you have integrated the culture of the place where you are living? Good question...not quite yet, I believe I still have to travel more within Italy to get to know her well!

Would you like to settle in Brisbane or Milan? Neither actually!

Do you support il Milan or l'Inter? Milan

Where do you first go when a friend comes to visit in Milan? Quick tour of Duomo/Castello/Parco Sempione then hit the pub for beers!

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UPSIDE DOWN

Cultural exchange is such an abused concept in our globalized age - We read, study and hear about it, of-ten in very theoretical ways. However, our personal experiences, those small episodes of exchange, of-ten go unnoticed. This section is dedicated to those who left, and those who came, those who turned their worlds upside down and agreed to tell us how they did it. This section is also an excuse to bring a lit-tle lightness to everyday life - We ask for your favourites, the best, the superlatives - never ask for less!

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Name: FrancescaSurname: UnedduCountry of origin: ItalyCurrent location: Milan (just back from exchange in AustraliaReason for trip: Bocconi Exchange ProgramDuration of stay: 5 monthsCountries visited in the past two years: Australia, Holland, Spain, England

What's the greatest difficulty you have had to face in your new surroundings? Getting used to living in a college, sharing bathroom and the cafeteria food.What is the first image that pops into your head when you hear the word chaos? My brother's roomThe most chaotic situation you have ever lived through? Going shopping in downtown Milan on a saturday afternoon (even more around Christmas)Chaos or silence? SilenceWhat do you miss most from back home? My friends and the foodSpecial bar or spot in Brisbane? SouthbankImportant newspaper/magazine in Brisbane? CouriermailMemorable song of 2009/2010: Lady Gaga's Poker face, Black Eyed peas' I gotta feeling

Memorable moment: A trip to Fraser Island on a Jeep in ten people and the camping on the sand

What would you like to know about the next upside down couple? No comment.

Here are the questions the previous upside down couple would like you to answer:

Do you feel that you have integrated the culture of the place where you are living? Yes, but 5 months are a very brief time to say i was "integrated". In addition, i think being an exchange student is an experience itself and it is very different than living and studying in a different country.

Would you like to settle in Brisbane or Milan? Brisbane and Australia in general are wonderful, but i'd like to settle in Europe, so i'd say Milan.

Do you support il Milan or l'Inter? Neither!

Where do you first go when a friend comes to visit in Brisbane? Southbank and the wild life sanctuary to hug the koalas!

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Writing an article is surely a demand-ing task and an intriguing challenge for every writer out there. However, composing a well structured and fas-cinating poetry of words is not the only way to approach a story; it is not necessarily suited for every situation. Sometimes another mode, a differ-ent tool, a more peculiar medium is needed. An interview perhaps? This section is a space that will house our curiosities by allowing us to ask questions. The aim is to go in depth and gain a better understanding through a constant quest for answers.

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RANDOMNESS =

CHAOS?

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This interview was born from the reflection on Chaos, and the link that Chaos might or might not have with randomness, with anything that happens by chance. In other words, does what happens by chance necessarily lead to a chaotic situation? Or, can the consequences of random events have an organized result?

Merce Cunningham, dancer and choreographer that passed away in July 2009 (aged 90), is con-sidered today the absolute master of Contempo-rary dance. His philosophy is build on playing and interacting with chance in order to “give back the space to the dancers”, as well as to “go beyond the limits of the own body”, as he explained in some interviews a few years ago.

Stephanie Serra: Solenne, you have studied in New York at the Merce Cun-ningham dance school, following the techniques and vi-sion of Mr. Cunningham, could you describe in a few lines his philosophy about dance?Solenne MascréCunningham’s Partner was John Cage. Together they proposed a number of radical innovations. The most famous and controversial of these concerned the rela-tionship between dance and music. They believed that they may occur in the same time and space, but should be created independently of one another. The two also made extensive use of chance procedures, abandoning not only musical forms, but also narrative and other conventional elements of dance composition—such as cause and effect, and climax and anticlimax. For Merce the subject of his dances was always dance itself.

S.S:What is the “event” concept of Merge Cunningham?S.M:An ''Event'' is a performance lasting about 90 minutes and consisting of bits and pieces from dances in the company's repertory.

S.S:I remember seeing the final dance performance of the year 2007 in which you were performing. What were the training methods you had to follow in order to present that final work? S.M:The training method was based on randomness and

chance. We were playing with cards and die to define which movement we were dancing, how, which space, what time, with whom. By way of example: we had to choose thirteen movements. Each movement was associ-ated with a card (as, … king of spades), then we had to pick a card that indicated which movement we had to do. So many rules defined the composition, the movement, the space, the number of dancers in the choreography.

S.S:Merce Cunningham also worked with other artists from different disciplines such as Jasper Johns, Robert Rauschenberg, Frank Stella or David Tudor. How do you think a multi-disciplinary approach to Art can deliver a new form of message?S.M:I do not believe in a new form of message. I don’t think it was Merce Cuningham’s intention. For Merce, the sub-ject of his dances was always dance itself. When you see a performance of Merce, you can enjoy the music in it-self, the dance in itself, the staging, the set design or the harmony of the multi-art discipline.

S.S:In what ways did your experience as a dancer is this particular dance school change your life?S.M:This experience was quite amazing. I had a really great time and my skills improved so much. It was not only a professional dance experience but a complete artistic experience. I met some choreographers, musicians, set designers and I discovered so many artistic approach-es. Furthermore, it was really interesting to dance with Merce before he died. The way he taught dance was intelligent and really different from what I had learned before. It was one of the best years of my life and it is still a wonderful memory.

S.S:A final question is regarding chance and chaos. After your experience, do you think that letting randomness decide leads to a chaotic result? S.M:This sentence is in contradiction with all of Merce’s works.

Solenne Mascré is a french dancer who lived and studied in New York at the Merce Cunnigham dance school. Today she works for public development at the quai Branly museum in Paris.

RANDOMNESS =

CHAOS?

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YOUR PHOTOSPECTIVES

THE WHERE DOES NOT MATTER

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YOUR PHOTOSPECTIVES

THE WHERE DOES NOT MATTER

Gaia Squarci

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Remy Amezcua

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Marta Chiapasco

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Jitna Bhagani

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Marta Moras

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53Gaia Squarci

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SCREENING

This section is about all music, theater, readings that make us think by screaming something new. It is about all the stories we come across in our cultural lives. Big stories of small characters and little stories of big characters. Some of these stories are hidden within music tunes while others live just for a few hours on a stage. Some of them re-main forever living inside novels and mov-ies, others are meteors on the internet. In fact, all the images we see every day screened through media are the oth-er important part of this section. From private relationships to public power, from production marketing, from cul-tural consumption, media are constantly evolving and modifying our behaviours, perceptions, lifestyles, and expectations.

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image: Umberto Boccioni, Serata futurista (ink caricature), 1911. L-R: Boccioni himself, Francesco Balilla Pratella, Filippo Tommaso Marinetti, Carlo Carrà and Luigi Russolo [http://www.internetculturale.it/upload/immagini/pag034-foto02-g.jpg].

MUSICHAOSMOS/ CONDUCTION

By Gabriele Marino

Living is a pastime whose meaning people try to get on the way.

Man has always invented strategies (religion, philoso-phy, politics, aesthetics; ideologies, in one word) to help him select elements from the surrounding world, orga-nize them and try to understand – uhm – something. His instruments have become more and more refined and powerful, but the aim has always been the same: don’t get lost in this mess. Music is a good pastime indeed. Maybe the best one.

Long time before James Gleick made a best-seller out of it, chaos had been considered the natural status of our experience. Our common starting point. Culture is nothing but trying to defeat chaos and conveying a par-ticular found (better, given) meaning as a socially shared value. Culture and its outputs, and art particularly, are simply an attempt to organize the chaos we are forced to live in. After Modernism, this has become a precise conscious artistic strategy. The last hold for the contem-porary artist is his capacity to organize materials. A mat-ter of forms, obviously, not of contents. The meaning of a given piece of art is no more something given by itself, but it is a – possible, not necessary – result of a dynamic process: the classic contract between author and user to make sense has become more like a struggle.

James Joyce defined Finnegans Wake (1939), a maze-like multidimensional story, a word-world, as a chaos-mos: the desperate attempt to find out the basic ele-ments of life, those few simple rules that generate the complexity of reality and history. A good visual trans-lation of this conception are Benoit Mandelbrot’s frac-tals: highly complex non-Euclidean geometric figures (halfway between planar and tridimensional) based on a very simple formula, that explain on a theoretic level the regular irregularity of nature (cells, vessels, neurons, snowflakes, leaves, courses of the rivers, seashore pro-files, etc.). Self similarity is their most important feature: the property of maintaining the same form and the same structure by any scale and resolution.

All this stuff can set some kind theoretical frame for

our reflections about music. We won’t talk about chaotic music (easy deal) but about music as a chaos, or bet-ter music and the balance of chaos and order. Chaosmos will be our keyword. And we’ll sketch some brief notes about one of the most exciting (and esoteric) fields of modern mu-sic: the conducted improvisa-tion.

Conducted improvisation has been codified by Califor-nian cornetist and composer Butch Morris (1947 born) through almost 200 conduc-tions since 1985. Morris re-connects to a long history of musical practices whose es-sential storyline might incor-porate: ancestral and primitive chiro-direction and collective rhythmic improvisation; the conception of music as orga-nized sound by Edgard Varèse («Give me some stuff and I’ll organize it for you»); aleatori-cism, musical collage and the revolution of noise as a mean of musical expression, from Futurists and Dada-ists to John Cage; Karleinz Stockhausen and Michael Vet-ter’s Intuitive Music (a free improvisation that conveys spirituality through music and music through spiritual-ity); free jazz extreme improvisation and interplay, from basic Ornette Coleman’s Free Jazz (1961; with a Jackson Pollock’s painting on the cover), to Sun Ra properly con-ducted improvisation exemplified by pieces like Chaos Music, in Heliocentric Worlds Volume Two (1966); Miles Davis’ silent instructions (In a Silent Way, 1969); Frank Zappa’s handsignals directions (a natural post-modern-

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Gabriele, 24 years old, studies communication in Palermo and writes about music (cooler than dancing about archi-tecture) for some websites and digital magazines, most no-tably Sentireascoltare.com. Like anyone else, he writes (no more), reads (very little), draws (little), plays (no more), lis-tens (very much), watches (enough). Like anyone else, he’s got a secret project to conquest the world whose apparently most relevant feature is it won’t never be implemented. He hates self introductions.

ist cabaret of musical forms); John Zorn's game pieces (since Cobra, 1987).

Conducted improvisation, or simply conduction, comes out as a way to integrate different musical ap-proaches and purposes into a coherent whole: joining

the orchestra sound and drive with the jazz feel and elasticity; composition (improvisation should be consid-ered like an instant composition, Frank Zappa said) and improvisation (totally improvised music is such a boring thing, according to John Zorn), control and automatism; avant-garde and didactic dimension; the strictness of a ruled game and the joyfulness of a play (it’s a strongly meta-linguistic – meta-musical – practice).

It is an avant-garde practice based on relationships: a duet which focus is to find a balance between the conductor's stream of consciousness and the collective stream of consciousness of the players. I'm not conduct-

ing – Morris says – in the traditional sense, I'm provok-ing or asking for certain things to happen, but even of those things I have no idea until I hear them. Musicians (their technique, musical background, specific features, personal tastes, personal history, etc.) become an inte-

gral part of the musical instruments palette: they play themselves. So that, any conduction is a work-shop, a laboratory, an ex-periment.

Like William S. Bur-roughs’ cut-ups, conduc-tions are made of blocks of material; otherwise, they use these blocks referring to a shared vocabulary of atomic musical elements (rhythms, tempos, notes, scales, genres, etc.) and signals (vocal and physi-cal ones) to recall them, trying to create a mean-ingful orientated dialectic of contrasts. Conductions live thanks to the balance of the full and the empty, of noisy clusters and si-lence, of crescendos and immobility.

Any conduction is a challenge: a heuristic challenge for both its cre-ators and users. The goal is to make the conduction itself as something pos-sible, get to and through it. There is a hope: man can still organize reality, can still look for a mean-ing. The cathartic value of art still holds on.

image: Umberto Boccioni, Serata futurista (ink caricature), 1911. L-R: Boccioni himself, Francesco Balilla Pratella, Filippo Tommaso Marinetti, Carlo Carrà and Luigi Russolo [http://www.internetculturale.it/upload/immagini/pag034-foto02-g.jpg].

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“Il giorno prima di cadere in quello stupido buco, avevo passato parecchio tempo a spazzolarmi i capelli. E come sempre, quando mi capita di fare qualcosa di monotono e ripetitivo, mi resi conto che non stavo pensando a niente. “Non è possibile non pensare a niente” avrebbe asserito con forza chiunque e chicchesia. In realtà, mai e poi mai nella loro vita, chiunque e chicchessia avevano visto ciò che io stavo, come dire, cercando di fissare. Ma...come si fa a guard-are...già...cosa sto guardando?Non mi ero mai accorta di questo posto. E giuro che ci sono pas-sata davanti parecchie volte. Avete presente il classico campo di spighe e grano, giallo come il sole e caldo come due. Quelli che visto uno li hai visti tutti. Ecco, questo meraviglioso campo di grano, inizia dietro la casa di Biagio e continua continua continua (potrei andare avanti) fino a un dirupo, un enorme spaccatura che si inabissa come un cono nella nuda terra ma che non mostra fondo. Perchè non ne ha uno.““E con questo siamo a tre” disse l’uomo con la carnagione più scura. “quattro” si sentì ribattere. “questa è la quarta storia che leggiamo su questo abisso”“Proviamo ancora? Lo apro di nuovo?” incalzò il primo. Ma il secondo non rispose. A passi lenti si stava muovendo verso la finestra, lo sguardo serio e la fronte come uno Shar-pei. Quei racconti lo stavano inquietando. Come è possibile che storie diverse, culture, mitologie, racconti e barzellette parlino tutte di questo luogo, nello stesso identico modo. Almeno il creatore nelle varie culture ha caratteristiche diverse: in una è un po’ più vendicativo, in un’altra si veste un po’ più casual. Ma questa cosa, questo luogo/non luogo era veramente inqui-etante ancor più del venditore di bibbie e di questo maledetto libro che stavamo “sfogliando”.Lo sguardo era ormai ben oltre i confini della città, si perdeva tra le campagne e correva verso le colline a nord della contea, veloce sopra il giallo campo di grano.Se ti stai chiedendo, lettore, qual’è il significato del campo di grano, sappi che non ce n’è uno in particolare. Lascio a te e alla tua fantasia il compito di affidarne uno. Ben più importante, sicuramente lo avrai capito, è l’abisso e il suo segreto. Ma prima di andare avanti, amico mio, bisogna che tu sia a tuo agio. Questo viaggio non sarà facile e richiederà tutto il tuo impegno, perchè come scoprirai, non sarai solo il mio interlocutore. Quindi siediti. Comodo. Magari con i piedi allungati su qualcosa. O certo, perchè no, direttamente sdraiato sul letto. Sii a tuo agio. Ed evita che qualcuno possa disturbarti. Spegni il cellulare e ributtati sulla tua poltrona; il libro saldo tra le mani.Il nostro viaggio comincia molto tempo fa, in un tempo che forse non c’è mai stato. Narrano le leggende che una primitiva tribù nel cuore della giungla africana celasse e custodisse il cuore del mondo, il nero cuore del mondo: l’eterno abisso. Ogni tempo, ogni cultura, ogni mondo ha avuto il suo abisso, quel luogo magico da cui tutto proviene e nel quale tutto torna. Il ritrovamento del libro del venditore di bibbie, ma che bibbia non è, ha riacceso la speranza in tutti quegli studiosi che disperavano di poter scoprire il segreto dell’eterno abisso. La risposta alla domanda fondamentale potrebbe non essere 42. Magari 142857. Chissà.

EDITOR'S CHOICE Quello stupido buco

di Tommaso Magistrelli

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Mi sono sempre chiesto perchè proprio la matematica. Tu non l’hai mai fatto? La matematica è una risposta on-nipresente a ciò che ci circonda. Si attaglia benissimo su qualsiasi cosa. Prendiamo la sezione aurea e la serie di fibonacci. Sapevi che la disposizione dei petali in un fiore segue queste serie numeriche?

Ma sarà veramente così? Proviamo a ribaltare la situazione. E se non fosse la sezione aurea a spiegare la disposizione dei petali, ma il contrario. O meglio ancora: e se dipendesse da noi, come il rumore di un albero che cade quando intorno non c’è nessuno? Non sei convinto, vero? Probabilmente starai pensando che in realtà sono discorsi da salotti filosofici e la matematica era solo un sadico strumento in mano a persone altrettanto sadiche.Non ti interessa ad esempio che la disposizione caotica delle macchine ai caselli sia spiegabile attraverso una gaussiana, che i quadrati di numeri composti da soli 1 siano numeri palindromi o che i numeri ciclici, che ancora non conosci, ti affascineranno tutta la vita.Facciamo un esperimento mentale. Immaginiamo per un istante la follia che il nostro mondo non sia altro che caos. In principio era il caos, poi il verbo. La parola doveva servire probabilmente a parlare dell’indescrivibile. Ma così facendo si è cominciato piano piano a compiere il parricidio. Dare dei contorni a qualcosa che intuitivamente non può averne è stato l’inizio della sua fine. Il caos ha iniziato a lasciare il posto all’ordine e all’armonia. Concetti decisamente più tranquillizanti ma sterili. Solo avendo il caos dentro, infatti, è possibile generare una stella danzante. Solo un grande dis-ordine, un profondo stato di malessere può generare un con-cetto tanto bello e potente quanto quello rappresentato da una stella danzante.

Nota alla lettura (ma se vuoi, caro lettore, o sei hai capito, non c’è bisogno di leggerla)Non voglio svelare tutti i contenuti nascosti di questo racconto, ma per facilitare la lettura mi sembra giusto ag-giungere che alcune parti di questo scritto sono riadattamenti, o addirittura veri e propri furti, di testi che se non hai letto, ti consiglio di fare subito. Tra questi: Alice di Lewis Carroll, Se una notte di inverno un viaggiatore di Italo Calvino e Il libro di Sabbia di Jorge luis Borges.

Tommaso Magistrelli è nato a Milano quasi 30 anni fa, spende la sua vita in balia degli eventi, preva-lentemente notturni, come dj o come uomo sbattimento. Giornalista non registrato all’albo, uno degli 11 di Art Kitchen, fondatore di ZoolutionZ, da pochi mesi, filosofo, da sempre, idealista e sognatore.

'Caos i forma' by Louis Sabadell Artiga

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