Visions & Contaminations between East and West in harmony with Carlo Scarpa

Exhibition curated by Francesca Valente

Walls that talk and listen Ljubodrag Andric creates large-scale photographs that dominate the entire field of vision, absorbing the viewer. Their visions linger on architectural details devoid of the human figure and are shot frontally, highlighting the metaphysical fixity of the walls and the horizontality of the lines that continue beyond the margins of the image. The walls Andric presents may be bare, but they are not silent. Abstract and naturalistic elements merge as the colourful backgrounds reminiscent of abstract painterly techniques are abruptly interrupted by details of concrete reality. Slowly we notice patches of damp creating a bloom of discolouration, imperfect layers of cement, cracks reaching across the façade, a resilient tuft of grass, or an incongruously placed door handle. These urban landscapes absent of any physical human form invite reflective contemplation as the walls are there, but not those who built them or those who lived behind them. Thus they challenge the viewer into engaging with a space inhabited by potential relationships, as we explore new visions and imbue the photographs with personal meaning and value. The dialogue generated by these images is further extended to include the space in which they are exhibited, the Fondazione Querini Stampalia, an inspiring and celebrated work of the architect Carlo Scarpa. Francesca Valente, the exhibition curator and former director of the Italian Cultural Institutes in San Francisco, Toronto, Vancouver, Chicago and Los Angeles, points out that, “in the context of the Fondazione Querini Stampalia, Andric interacts with Carlo Scarpa in a dimension suspended between the East and the West, and intrinsic to Venice. His glance is attracted particularly by the hidden garden, the ideal place for an inner journey, however incomplete or tenuous. As a result, the images create a path of effective emotional synthesis, which takes the form of a complex and layered personal identity. We are presented with a wealth of suggestions and memories, observations and reflections, that appear paradoxically remote and familiar, ancient and contemporary.” Tobia Scarpa, an architect like his father Carlo, also contributes to the accompanying text of the exhibition as he observes the dialogic potential of photographs. He notes, “In the powerful images by Ljubodrag Andric […] form and human heritage are investigated in a manner devoid of pretence or presumption that invites curious and reflective