2012 | OPERA PRIZE – THE WAYS OF WATER
RAVENNA - Civic Gallery Oriani | COLLECTIVE
CERVIA (Ravenna) - I magazzini del Sale | COLLECTIVE
How is it possible for man to succeed in an unnatural environment for him?
Every great civilization was born thanks to a watercourse as a reference point and also thanks to the will of man walking on not certain ways in order to reduce otherwise unbridgeable distances.
A river, a sea or ocean seem endless, but they link together distant places and different cultures. However, it is not only geographical distance to have been reduced.
Any boat is a microreality. Somehow, dynamics and circumstances that are created on it they redraw physical and social distances of the protagonists
The sense of unity, solidarity and sharing grows. Maybe because they have in common an unnatural and limited context?
You accept to live together in confined spaces that defy the rules of proxemics. Those same spaces that we precisely recognize on the land, distinguishing intimate relationships, personal and formal.
n a boat everyone has a crucial and recognized role, but this does not create gaps but, paradoxically, our conventions, reduces social distance. The status does not increase unjust differences, because each role has its own importance that leads to recognition of the nobility of each function.
What is important it is finding a connection, a balance, an understanding. That should be also present in the life on earth.
The OPERA project - organized by the CGIL of Ravenna and in collaboration with the Academy of Fine Arts of Ravenna, partnered by Region of Emilia Romagna and the City and the Province of Ravenna - is dedicated to the theme "Waterways": man's activities found in water, seas, rivers good places for getting transport, trade, discovery and contamination of different cultures and histories. Around the water came the civilization of work, it has increased the dialogue between peoples.