Spiderwall

About

July will see MOCA London host Francesca Pasquali’s (Bologna,1980) new site-specific installation called Spiderwall. The work is made up of thousands of simple, colourful cobweb dusters. The immersive work forms a plastic cloud floating in the air and illustrates the latest step in Pasquali’s artistic research.

Pasquali’s work has been influenced by the heritage of the Arte Povera movement which sought to repurpose mundane or everyday objects. She uses drinking straws, elastic bands, and at MOCA cobweb dusters to make installations, sculptures and wall based works. There is of course also a performative aspect to her labour intensive processes, and the end results show the passage of time (her time spent making them) and are also representative of the loss of permanence and the ever present ticking away of time. These are not objects cast in bronze, but are fragile, and speak of the temporariness of life. They are in fact contemporary still lives. Viewers will step through a doorway into her installation, and bodily enter her work at MOCA. The possibility of a dialogue with the work and other viewers is at the core of her practice.

Pasquali’s work derives from the observation of natural shapes and their structural texture which she tries to emulate. New technologies are an integral part of her work, which also includes sound, light and video installations like Glasswall (2015), a kinetic and interactive work. She was a finalist of the Cairo Prize 2015 and won Second Prize at the2014 Henraux Foundation Prize. Pasquali’s works are in public institutions and private collections in Italy.

The installation will coincide with her solo show Francesca Pasquali_Metamorphoses at Tornabuoni Art London (29 June – 17 September) where she will present a wide range of her practice. The exhibition will be accompanied by a catalogue, published

by Forma Edizioni, Florence. Pasquali’s works will be fully illustrated and the book will have an introductory essay by Fatos Ustek, an interview with the artist by ICA curator Matt Williams, and a text by Michael Petry, MOCA’s director.