TIMELESS ENCOUNTERS on the pages of TL MAG

PRESS FEATURE

TIMELESS ENCOUNTERS

- FRAGMENTS FOR THE FUTURE

"AEVUM" EXHIBITION BY KALPA ON THE PAGES OF TL MAGAZINE

ISSUE 38 GUEST EDITORS: LIDEWIJ EDELKOORT AND PHILIP FIMMANO

In a timeless quest for reconciliation with our primordial creative energy and consequent determination to forge new paths in our living, looking back to our origins may be the only way to read our present and lay the foundations for our future. As suggested by Editor-in-Chief and Publisher of TL magazine Lise Coirier, “Today we feel more than vulnerable, but we are probably also more committed to transforming our ways of living and envisioning the future.”

The program of three annual exhibitions TIMELESS ENCOUNTERS is grounded in this conceptual landscape and contemplates the perpetual cyclical movement of history and art history, bringing together a selection of contemporary artworks and archeological artifacts. The overall initiative opens to broad research beyond the classical, particularly the Etruscan world, triggering reflections about the potential connections between the past and the present in terms of art, aesthetic sensibility, and human feelings. Promoted by KALPA Galleries and Guarnacci Etruscan Museum, TIMELESS ENCOUNTERS was inaugurated with the exhibition AEVUM in the year of Volterra - First Tuscan City of Culture 2022.

While we are outlining the creative directions for the second exhibition, to be opened in Volterra in the forthcoming summer of 2023, we are enthusiastic about having the AEVUM exhibition featured in TL Magazine #38, curated by guest editors Lidewij Edelkoort and Philip Fimmano, and dedicated to ancestry and to the intricate cultural connections through different times.

In her editorial introduction, international trend forecaster Lidewij Edelkoort reiterates an authentic, true concept: the strength of humankind lies in its experimental, intuitive, and inventive nature. Promoting the urgency of new energy for designing a better and different future, she argues how “the ingredients to greatness lie in our past”, and indicates ancient fragments of matter, organic shapes, robust materials, and archaic art as a cornerstone to achieving renewed creativity.

"Through the antecedents of tomorrow, studying ancient fragments of matter and mentality, the circle feels complete as we rediscover organic shapes, robust materials and archaic art."

- Lidewij Edelkoort & Philip Fimmano

According to this statement, AEVUM was indeed an equilibrium of forms and earthly materials, a dance of textures and colours, presenting precious archeological objects from the permanent collection of the Museum, in dialogue with contemporary artworks by ceramist Akiko Hirai and painter Eleanor Herbosch.

The exhibition generated moments of wonder and knowledge when the eternal flow of time seemed to be stilled. The porosity of the textures, movements, fractures, and signs were features shared between the Museum’s three unique artifacts and the contemporary artworks. The vivid, scratched marks made in acrylic, oil, and clay of Herbosch's paintings established a connection with the emotional charge of Etruscan writing, while Hirai’s ceramic sculptures shared a similar exploration of forms, on the verge of a poetics between finito and non-finito.

TIMELESS ENCOUNTERS | AEVUM

MUSEO ETRUSCO GUARNACCI - archeological artifacts
AKIKO HIRAI (Japan/UK) - ceramics
ELEANOR HERBOSCH (Belgium) - painting

Artistic curatorship and critical texts: Eleonora Raspi, KALPA Art Living
Scientific curatorship: Fabrizio Burchianti, Museo Etrusco Guarnacci

JULY - SEPTEMBER 2022 | VOLTERRA, Tuscany