Dolcedo, Italy
|
Hosted by artist Claudia Borgna
Event Name: Mighty Like a Flower! Location: Parrocchia San Domenico e Cappella di San Bartolomeo Workshop: July 20, 2015, 10am–2pm Celebration: July 27, 2015, 8pm Echoing the site-specific installation set on the grounds of Montalvo in 2010, this celebration will take the form of a picnic amidst the ligurian olive groves. A gathering with children and parents, participants will workshop observations on art and nature while making an installation of rose-like flowers made out of recycled plastic bags on which we will embed thoughts about our relationship to nature. The event is part of a two week art project. The workshop will be followed by a presentation in which Montalvo will be celebrated as an example for future projects in and for the local community. Read more about it (if you read Italian) in the Imperia Post. |
Open Workshop: July 20
|
|
|
All photos above by Donna Lee Corboy.
MIGHTY LIKE A FLOWER!
by Claudia Borgna
From valley to valley, from Saratoga to Dolcedo, from the US to Italy: imagine, a world that for one day is all covered up with flowers!
Pollens and seeds crossing lands and oceans, vulnerable and ephemeral, yet strong and resilient, they morph the spaces they find. Generating beauty, they oxygenate the air binding it to our hearts and minds.
A project commissioned in 2011 by the Montalvo Arts Center, Mighty like a Flower was a site-specific temporary installation set on Montalvo's Great Lawn. There, 500 giant flowers grew over a period of two months' time, mingling with nature and to my delight, enjoyed by a keen and curious public. Through a series of workshops, volunteers contributed to the installation. I nostalgically remember my time spent with teenagers, mums, and people of all ages and backgrounds gathered together making flowers out of plastic. The scent of Montalvo’s laurels arouses many beautiful memories.
Once a private villa, Montalvo was bequeathed to the public by its owner, Senator James Duval Phelen, to encourage promising students of art, architecture, poetry, and more. Thanks to philanthropists’ and nature lovers’ support, for the last 10 years, Montalvo's magnificent grounds have been the site of the Lucas Artists Residency Program.
This year Montalvo, has invited its past residents to celebrate their 75/10 anniversaries. Between 10th and 24th of July, artists from all around the world are united. From each of their towns, the gift of time and space that Montalvo has been generously granting to hundreds of artists worldwide, will be celebrated in what in fact is the celebration of creativity and of nature.
Art and artists are like bees: crossing spaces they link and bind, bridging people, ideas and cultures – possibly the only positive aspect of globalization. So here it is, the link and an opening to new possibilities: transformations.
It is not just a historical and cultural connection between Italy and the United States. Very similar to Mediterranean countries in terms of climate, California is a prosperous land were Nature allows for vineyards and olive groves, almonds and citrus trees to thrive. In the era of corporate globalization where rampant privatization is appropriating – whether forcefully or by coercing people’s life styles – all spaces: public, cultural and natural, we would like to disrupt the linearity of a habit and reverse that relentless process with a flower. Inspired by Montalvo’s example of opening spaces up for the public to bloom, we want to plant the ancient seed for it to sprout, humble and mighty, and encourage what I call “flowers activism.”
The pollen of Montalvo, blown by the wind that carried a bee, crossed the ocean and landed here, on this soil, to become a “spiga di grano." Montalvo’s celebration becomes Dolcedo’s occasion for “becoming” and to reclaim public space, in this instance: il forno di Dolcedo (or the oven of Dolcedo). Historical, symbolic, and practical, the wood oven is the celebration of Dolcedo’s many potentials. Because beyond western abstraction of power, of man’s consumerist politics and of western commodified economy, there is nothing as mighty as a flower, mighty as a seed, mighty as water, air and fire: mighty like earth. The forno of Dolcedo is the meeting point of all those elements, embraced, respected, and honored by all.
Here in the forno di Dolcedo, we plant the seeds of creativity, of solidarity and awareness – a political but also poetic gesture. Art at the service of the people, art at the service of nature to remember moments of beauty, to commemorate what as a society we have been losing. To remind us that as human beings we still need nature to survive, to question our real and fundamental necessities – and not just humans social priorities.
Through the ancient and forgotten wood oven of Dolcedo we aim at reclaiming healthy habits harmonious with nature. This will be a collective moment of creative communion between nature and cultures. To share and commemorate my experience at Montalvo we will engage in a little workshop, an art picnic, but also in a final festive presentation of “seeds” that celebrates our cosmic interconnected tenses.
Not just a beautiful metaphor, the aesthetic manifestation of seeds – flowers are agents of transformation.
This event is a joint venture and a volunteers collaborative effort between mum and entrepreneur Monica Orengo, Artist Donna Lee Corboy, Cultural association U Casu Novu, Il Comune di Dolcedo, Montalvo Arts Center and myself, Claudia Borgna artist and bee to be.
From valley to valley, from Saratoga to Dolcedo, from the US to Italy: imagine, a world that for one day is all covered up with flowers!
Pollens and seeds crossing lands and oceans, vulnerable and ephemeral, yet strong and resilient, they morph the spaces they find. Generating beauty, they oxygenate the air binding it to our hearts and minds.
A project commissioned in 2011 by the Montalvo Arts Center, Mighty like a Flower was a site-specific temporary installation set on Montalvo's Great Lawn. There, 500 giant flowers grew over a period of two months' time, mingling with nature and to my delight, enjoyed by a keen and curious public. Through a series of workshops, volunteers contributed to the installation. I nostalgically remember my time spent with teenagers, mums, and people of all ages and backgrounds gathered together making flowers out of plastic. The scent of Montalvo’s laurels arouses many beautiful memories.
Once a private villa, Montalvo was bequeathed to the public by its owner, Senator James Duval Phelen, to encourage promising students of art, architecture, poetry, and more. Thanks to philanthropists’ and nature lovers’ support, for the last 10 years, Montalvo's magnificent grounds have been the site of the Lucas Artists Residency Program.
This year Montalvo, has invited its past residents to celebrate their 75/10 anniversaries. Between 10th and 24th of July, artists from all around the world are united. From each of their towns, the gift of time and space that Montalvo has been generously granting to hundreds of artists worldwide, will be celebrated in what in fact is the celebration of creativity and of nature.
Art and artists are like bees: crossing spaces they link and bind, bridging people, ideas and cultures – possibly the only positive aspect of globalization. So here it is, the link and an opening to new possibilities: transformations.
It is not just a historical and cultural connection between Italy and the United States. Very similar to Mediterranean countries in terms of climate, California is a prosperous land were Nature allows for vineyards and olive groves, almonds and citrus trees to thrive. In the era of corporate globalization where rampant privatization is appropriating – whether forcefully or by coercing people’s life styles – all spaces: public, cultural and natural, we would like to disrupt the linearity of a habit and reverse that relentless process with a flower. Inspired by Montalvo’s example of opening spaces up for the public to bloom, we want to plant the ancient seed for it to sprout, humble and mighty, and encourage what I call “flowers activism.”
The pollen of Montalvo, blown by the wind that carried a bee, crossed the ocean and landed here, on this soil, to become a “spiga di grano." Montalvo’s celebration becomes Dolcedo’s occasion for “becoming” and to reclaim public space, in this instance: il forno di Dolcedo (or the oven of Dolcedo). Historical, symbolic, and practical, the wood oven is the celebration of Dolcedo’s many potentials. Because beyond western abstraction of power, of man’s consumerist politics and of western commodified economy, there is nothing as mighty as a flower, mighty as a seed, mighty as water, air and fire: mighty like earth. The forno of Dolcedo is the meeting point of all those elements, embraced, respected, and honored by all.
Here in the forno di Dolcedo, we plant the seeds of creativity, of solidarity and awareness – a political but also poetic gesture. Art at the service of the people, art at the service of nature to remember moments of beauty, to commemorate what as a society we have been losing. To remind us that as human beings we still need nature to survive, to question our real and fundamental necessities – and not just humans social priorities.
Through the ancient and forgotten wood oven of Dolcedo we aim at reclaiming healthy habits harmonious with nature. This will be a collective moment of creative communion between nature and cultures. To share and commemorate my experience at Montalvo we will engage in a little workshop, an art picnic, but also in a final festive presentation of “seeds” that celebrates our cosmic interconnected tenses.
Not just a beautiful metaphor, the aesthetic manifestation of seeds – flowers are agents of transformation.
This event is a joint venture and a volunteers collaborative effort between mum and entrepreneur Monica Orengo, Artist Donna Lee Corboy, Cultural association U Casu Novu, Il Comune di Dolcedo, Montalvo Arts Center and myself, Claudia Borgna artist and bee to be.
