CONTEXTO 2016

Curated by Marta Cereda, Davide Dall’Ombra and Giuseppe Frangi
Edolo (BS)
1 July – 8 September 2016

After the great success of the summer of 2015, Edolo presented Contexto 2016, an exhibition of contemporary art in the centre of the town, with an edition full of novelties and a whole new range of artists, able to amaze and involve the public. The aim was to surpass the success of last year’s edition, when the town was invaded by artists, curators, critics and art enthusiasts who fascinated and involved a wide Italian and international audience, including many young people and families.

28 selected artists, authors of an equal number of installations and residencies that contaminated the town, creating a unique itinerary: their art entered the squares, alleyways and courtyards, as well as disused shops, abandoned old residences, the walls of private homes and windows that became the frames for mural works. Thus, diffuse art lit up Edolo as part of a calendar of events dedicated to contemporary art, which also included meetings with the artists themselves and guided tours, both day and night, of the exhibition.

Promoted and organised by the Municipality of Edolo, which availed itself of the skilful direction of Casa Testori, the new edition of Contexto took place between 1 July and 8 September 2016, a period of time that embraced the entire tourist season.

A particularly rich parterre of Italian and foreign artists – including many from Brescia and Lombardy – together with some emerging artists, exhibited their sculptures, installations, photographs and videos inspired by the Edolese context to enhance and reinterpret the characteristic places of the town, following the leitmotif of the contamination of genres. These works have in some cases remained permanently in the Camonica area. This was a unique opportunity for tourists, who were able to get to know Edolo in a new and different light, but also for the inhabitants themselves, who took the opportunity to discover corners they had never seen up close or rediscover places linked to their historical or personal memories.

The itinerary began in the centre of Edolo, with a tribute to Giovanni Testori, evoked in the first station of Contexto in the Palazzo del Comune, and with the works created for the occasion by Mauro Maffezzioni, d’aprés of Romanino’s frescoes, and then wound through the streets of the village through the works of the 28 artists: Adriana Albertini, Davide Baroggi, Andrea Bianconi, Paolo Brambilla, Andrea Bruschi, Monica Carrera, Emma Ciceri, Massimo Dalla Pola, Francesca Damiano, Emanuele Dottori, Francesco Fossati, Andrea Fiorino, Riccardo Gavazzi, Dario Goldaniga, Julia Krahn, Marina Lo Russo, Mauro Maffezzoni, Matteo Maino, Fulvia Mendini, Piero 1/2Botta, Matteo Negri, Luca Petti, Domenico Pievani, Michela Pomaro, Davide Rivalta, Anna Turina, Aleksander Veliscek, Giulio Zanet.

A very long orange thread, suspended over the village, traced the path of the exhibition. Orange like the colour symbol of Contexto. Orange like Christo’s magnificent utopia come true on Lake Iseo, just a few kilometres from Edolo. For Giuseppe Frangi of Casa Testori, «The orange […] is the colour symbol of this vitality, of this ability to surprise, that the artists will pour for two months among the streets and the houses of this magnificent country. Theirs are forward-looking glances full of poetry; they are also shocks of confidence and passion, capable of “making Contexto”. That is, to contaminate places. But also of establishing a “con-text”. That is, a common “text” between those who create and those who participate as curious observers, critics, and in the end happily accomplices of this great, beautiful festival of art in the mountains. Because Contexto wants and must be a festival».