Ecosistemi – Biagiotti Progetto Arte Foundation
Florence 24th November 2016 – 28th February 2017
From the catalogue:
“The site-specific installation created by Simafra does not intend to re-create a natural setting, but rather a fictional space which is at the same time real and virtual, a space that is not located in any part of our world and yet it tells us something about ourselves and the society we live in.
In this imaginary universe created by man almost by accident, the latter is a cumbersome presence, represented by the carcass of a car that is slowly being swallowed up by the surrounding environment. But this forest is also a place for the soul, a metaphor for the interiority of the artist himself. The tree branch, which slowly grows around the carcass, lifting it and incorporating it in its process of self-liberation, mimics the self-liberation of the artist, his creativity and his inner life.
Through recovered elements, natural stabilized elements and by the use of materials that have always characterized the poetry of Simafra, the viewer is catapulted into a small imaginary world dominated by Nature. This depiction is of a pure Nature that is finally rebelling against the oppression of Man, and which in its violence becomes a synonym of Simafra’s inner journey itself. Hence, the title Autostima, reminds us that every act of self-liberation is also, at the same time, an act of self-love such as that underlying every action of the artist’s Nature.”
Carlotta Mazzoli e Silvia Bellotti – Curators