Abitare il Minerale

“Mineral is something of our bodies, because bones are made of calcium that belongs to the world surrounding us; mineral is the part of our bodies that is most stable and which can last over time. Bone remains can be found, while our flesh and fluids disappear sooner. In minerals, in marble, there is a stability, and it is not a coincidence that this stone has been used for centuries in sculpture; its whiteness is something that belongs to us, to our bodies, like our bones. The interest we have for things that surround us is always related to wanting to understand reality, and it is an understanding that is filtered through our bodies. We breathe minerals, we breathe dust, we breathe sand. It is something that is part of our lives, and each of our breaths are sculpture because their forms have the physical and chemical composition of air and when we inhale we create a volume.”
–Giuseppe Penone in conversation with Carolyn Christov-Bakargiev, Abitare il Minerale, Castello di Rivoli, May 17, 2017

“Intra-actions are practices of making a difference, of cutting together-apart, entangling-differentiating (one move) in the making of phenomena. Phenomena—entanglements of matter/ing across spacetimes—are not in the world, but of the world.”

“Ontological indeterminacy, a radical openness, an infinity of possibilities, is at the core of mattering. How strange that indeterminacy, in its infinite openness, is the condition for the possibility of all structures in their dynamically reconfiguring in/stabilities. Matter in its iterative materialization is a dynamic play of in/determinacy. Matter is never a settled matter. It is always already radically open. Closure cannot be secured when the conditions of im/possibilities and lived indeterminacies are integral, not supplementary, to what matter is. Nothingness is not absence, but the infinite plentitude of openness.”
–Karen Barad, What Is the Measure of Nothingness? Infinity, Virtuality, Justice. 100 Notes - 100 Thoughts | N°099. dOCUMENTA (13), Hatje Cantz Publishing, 2012

Abitare il Minerale is a trans-disciplinary project of artistic production, research, discussion, and learning, where different languages, places, activities, and agents work together to investigate horizons of thought on our relationship with the environment and the notion of creativity, in light of the philosophical and scientific theories that have extended the notion of agency—that is, the “capacity to act”—to the non-human and inorganic world.

It offers a program of initiatives that include performances, cognitive explorations, discussions, conferences, and lessons, in geosites and quarries across Piedmont and at the Castello di Rivoli Museo d’Arte Contemporanea, with the participation of: Giovanni Anselmo, Carolyn Christov-Bakargiev, Karen Barad, Massimo Bartolini, Francesco Bernardelli, Leonardo Caffo, Andrea Caretto and Raffaella Spagna, Francesca Cirilli, Luca De Leva, Irene Dionisio, Roberto Fassone, Anselm Franke, Marco Giardino, Marianne Heier, Kunstgress Dance Collective, Giuseppe Penone, and others.

Abitare il Minerale is produced by a.titolo in collaboration with Castello di Rivoli Museo d’Arte Contemporanea with the support of “Ora! Linguaggi contemporanei, produzioni innovative” of Compagnia di San Paolo.

It is drafted by Francesca Comisso, Luisa Perlo and Marianna Vecellio

Upcoming events in June:

June 16, 2017
Troubling Time/s and Ecologies of Nothingness: Re-turning, Re-membering, and Facing the Incalculable
Key-note Lecture by Karen Barad, Theoretical Physicist and Feminism Theorist
Castello di Rivoli 

June 17, 2017
The Quarry Experience
Cognitive exploration by artists Andrea Caretto and Raffaella Spagna with Marco Giardino, Professor of Physical Geography and Geomorphology
Clay quarry of Munlab, Cambiano, and Gypsum quarry, Moncucco Torinese