Breadcrumbs

09 May 2022

On Friday May 20, the inauguration of VICE VERSĀ, a project by Alfredo Pirri, Helga Marsala and Pietro Leone, will be held at the Paraboloid in Casale Monferrato

An audio-visual artwork starting with the installation "PASSI" (STEPS) by the renowned artist Alfredo Pirri, through the performance of Buzzi Unicem employees 

"VICE VERSĀ" is about to land toward the Paraboloid, symbol of the history of cement. This project originated in the spring of 2021 from Alfredo Pirri's installation entitled "PASSI," presented at the Maniace Castle in Syracuse (curated by Helga Marsala and produced by ADITUS for the Superintendency of Syracuse). 
On Friday, May 20 at 6:30 p.m. a temporary space dedicated to the meeting between art and industrial archaeology will be inaugurated in the presence of Federico Riboldi, Mayor of Casale Monferrato, of the Institutions, of Buzzi Unicem's Association "il Cemento" - promoter of the initiative - of the artists and of the citizens, and will be available for use for the entire weekend, from 6 p.m. until midnight.
This event will be the first example to launch the Paraboloid towards a path of revitalization, turning it into a multipurpose facility and cultural center. 

"VICE VERSĀ" an audio/video artwork resulting from a collaboration between the artist Alfredo Pirri, the filmmaker and musician Pietro Leone and the curator and art critic Helga Marsala, develops thanks to the dialogue between the imposing medieval architecture of the Maniace Castle - which hosted the "STEPS" installation in recent months - and the Buzzi Unicem plant in Augusta. 
After a lectio magistralis by Pirri, held at the premises of the Sicilian factory and dedicated to the company's employees, speaking about the reinvention of reality through contemporary art, the setting moved to the Maniace Castle involving some of the employees in a performance, guided by Pirri to interact with the surfaces, spaces, lights and memory of the venue, in a collective gesture of appropriation: walking on the mirrors of the Hypostyle Hall, drawing the paths of new fractures, in order to contribute to the reinterpretation and rewriting of the space, altered at every glance and at every step.
In an unusual correlation, the experience inside the grand Hypostyle Hall is then reflected in the industrial site of Augusta, creating an exchange of volumes, presences, sounds, and suggestions. It is an enthralling dialogue between two "theaters," where the transformation of things (whether raw materials, images, history, technical or humanistic knowledge) becomes a dramaturgy of processes, objects, human relations.

Thinking of the Paraboloid as an exceptional place for promoting a project, whose focus is on artistic experimentation, as well as on the relationship between art and the working world, is a way to symbolically launch this building in a new direction, under the sign of local identity, culture and the deep-rooted relationship with the company. Prior to the upcoming conservative restoration work, the intention would thus be to celebrate its current charm, rich in memory and images of the past, together with the power of industrial and architectural innovation processes, while waiting for the complete renovation of the spaces, underpinning a new life.


The set-up area of the Paraboloid will be open to the public, with free admission, on May 20-21-22 from 6 p.m. until midnight.