Emanuele Dottori, ON THE THRESHOLD
At the entrance was the frottage of one of the graffiti still visible in a cell. At least one word read clearly and seemed to describe the situation better than any other: Hell. On entering one of the twin rooms, the one on the left, a large canvas showed the only horizon visible from the opposite cell. Beyond the barred door, a precise view of Edolo looked out at us, to be peeked at through the small criss-crossed window. The town was inside and the view inside projected out.
In this exchange there was the whole sense of Dottori’s work: the prisoner dreams of his free and luminous Edolo and the city sees itself and its history within the narrowness of those four dark walls. A small canvas and its negative linked the two rooms and invited us to go into the other one. Once across the threshold, the unimaginable was revealed: an escape was possible and the slit wall opened up to the surrounding mountains. For those who had escaped and those who had not, a view of Edolo by night peeped out from the square of the ceiling. An earthly city that becomes heavenly would not have displeased Zeffirino.
THE ARTWORKS
Maybe one morning, 2016, chalk and primal on fabric prepared with chalk, 140×200 cm
Sleepless night, 2016, oil on fabric, 250×210 cm
Diptych, 2016:
Azzerucis id Aremac, oil on fabric, 23×21.5 cm
Safe room, chalk and primal on fabric, 23×21.5 cm
The sky above Edolo, 2016, oil on fabric, 140×270 cm
Daydreaming, 2016, chalk and primal on fabric, 250×210 cm