“THE WINTER SYMPHONY” BY ALESSANDRO SCIARAFFA

The Winter Symphony is composed of vibrant sculptures which mold the exhibition space into an immersive experience. Each visitor is provided with the unique opportunity to interact with lights, shadows and sounds in a groundbreaking way. The fleeting gestures will set on impalpable shadows creating sculptures made of vibrations, placing the visitor in the midst of a sea of lights, shadows and sounds. Once again, Sciaraffa’s foray into new technologies paves the way to his endless fascination and exploration of Nature. Technology and Nature at peace.

Curated by Valentino Catricala (Italy), Sofia Kudryavtseva (State Hermitage).
Coordinated by Rodion Ataulin (State Hermitage).

The opening night took place on January 30 (Wednesday) at 7 PM at the Youth Education Center at the State Hermitage at Dvortsovaya pl., 6-8. Entry by invitation or advanced registration.

Viewing Hours: 1 PM to 5 PM. Access to exhibition is from Dvortsovaya pl. (Palace Square) through the museum zone of General Staff Building; with tickets to the museum complex of General Staff Building.

Download the press release (PDF)

“The Winter Symphony” – Exhibition Tour by Valentino Catricala

Sciaraffa’s research is centered on sound and musical experimentation, with a strong performative, sculptural and installational connotation. His works are synesthetic, and the viewer participates in a process of autopoiesis. Waves, frills, vibrations, intermediate states of matter: the works of Sciaraffa are points of contact between the physical phenomena from which they are generated and the transformations that they induce inside the spaces that involve them. The identity of the works is not exposed, but rather disguised behind external appearances: brass plates, liquid crystal surfaces, and photosensitive papers are simple supports or resonant containers of chromatic epiphanies or sound events, which in turn are significant only as detectors of the perturbations that cross the space.

Alessandro Sciaraffa graduated in Architecture from Politecnico di Torino, he also studied at the Fondazione Spinola Banna and Stockhausen Foundation Germany, received a degree in  Designe in Exhibition Domus Academy Milan, and received a degree in Electronic Music and  Sound Design from MAXXI B.A.S.E, Rome.  His work has been displayed at Fondazione Merz, Turin, Fondazione Sandretto Re Rebaudengo, Turin, GAM Galleria Civica d’Arte moderna e contemporanea di Torino, Turin,  Musèe ocèanographique de Monaco, Monaco, Museo della Permanente, Milan, Museo  MAXXI, Rome, Fondazione Stockhausen per la musica, Kurten, Base sous-marine, Bordeaux, among others.

Valentino Catricalà, scholar and contemporary art curator specialized in the analysis of the relationship of artists with new technologies and media. He has been a PhD visiting at ZKM Center for Arts and Media (Karlsruhe, Germany), University of Dundee (Scotland) and Tate Modern (London, UK). He is currently the artistic director of the Media Art Festival at the MAXXI Museum (Rome, Italy), art projects coordinator at Fondazione Mondo Digitale (Rome, Italy), professor at Rome Fine Arts Academy (Italy). Lives and works in Rome, Italy.

Two lectures will be held as part of the project:

February 2, Saturday, 3 PM — “Symphony of Alessandro Sciaraffa”. Alessandro Sciaraffa and Valentino Catricala will participate in the lecture. The project’s curator Valentino Catricala will talk about the interaction of art and technology in sound art and analyze Alessandro Sciaraffa’s projects from the point of view of contemporary Italian art context. Then he, together with Alessandro Sciaraffa, will talk about the artist’s previous projects.

The lecture will be held in English with translation into Russian. Free admission by advanced registration (in Russian).

February 3, Sunday, 3 PM — “Experimental Application of Algorithms of Artificial Intelligence and its Potential in Contemporary Art”.

Participants of the art duo “Endless Attractions Museum” (Yekaterinburg). Anastasia Krokhaleva and Denis Perevalov will talk about possible methods of experimenting with modern algorithms of artificial intelligence and their use in contemporary art:

1. To choose a base, simple algorithm and study the ways of its development;
2. To get armed with an “advanced” API in the field of analysis and data transformation, to check out what it is capable of, to understand the current limit of its capabilities and to surpass it;
3. To take a newest, not yet completed study and to do a project based on their current outcome;
4. To do a project that uses the unexplored fields of AI.