Angiola Bonanni
ON MY WORK 2008
Over recent years, my work has developed along two lines, both influenced by my interest in
"low", or popular, art forms. The autobiographic side, for instance -- masks, collage-comics
and photonovels-- has drawn on my early knack for cartoons and the memory of Italian
fotoromanzi of the ‘50s, now better known as the Hispanic fotonovela, that is, corny love
stories in the format of comic books, but compiled using photographs and captions.
Both series, masks and fotoromanzi, are still ongoing.
My other line of work has been the making of objects that mix high-tech elements and
traditional crafts, which I call “mestizo objects”. These originate from my extensive traveling
in developing countries, that has allowed me to study the strategies used by their artisans to
keep up with mechanically produced images. For instance, the novelties introduced in handpainted
store signs in Africa, or the efforts to incorporate “modern” visual elements in a handmade
production.
It was in an Arab country, Tunisia, where I first started mixing photography with an old
Mediterranean craft called sous-verre (painting under glass), developing a technique that has since
become very representative of my work, because it stands a symbol of fusion between the traditional
and the modern and between the art history of the North and the South of the Mediterranean.
This is the technique that I intend to use for my participation in the Gedächtnis project, for which I
am already working on some sketches.
Another constant in my work, maybe due to my Roman childhood, is the interest in the
historical past, often represented by the ruins of monuments or factories. All the elements I
have described came together during my stay in Berlin, in 2000-2001, when I produced a
body of work that was exhibited in three different venues in the following years (Neue Galerie
of Karl Hofer Gesellschaft in 2001, Italian Cultural Institute in 2002 and Alte Schule
Adlershof in 2007)
From my interest in popular memorabilia came the series of postcards “Gruss aus Berlin”, and
the “Soft Postcard” video installation.
And my interest in ruins that bear witness to a past history found its expression in the
videoinstallation « Deutsch für Ausländer », shown as part of « Arbeit-Kultur-Arbeit », where
the industrial archeology of the district of Oberschöneweide is explained with love and irony
at the same time in the format of 20 German lessons for foreigners, now on DVD.
Just as I tried to make the history of Oberschöneweide accessible in an indirect way, I believe
that a mixed-breed object, one that mingles high and low art, can help make the signification
of Gedächtniskirche accessible. By the use of the sous-verre, it will be the medium itself that
will bring together the worlds where this technique can still be found—West Africa and the
Mediterranean—and the history of Central Europe, of which the half-destroyed church can be
seen as a symbol. Thus, the signification of this symbol will be expanded and understood by
the increasingly wide range of newcomers that will quite likely settle in our continent.
