Over the course of a six-month residency at Careof, Diego Marcon undertook an erratic journey through the archivio video di Careof, thus responding to the invitation of Performing Archive. FRANTI, FUORI! is the exhibition that concludes this experience.

The archive gradually revealed itself, showing every one of its folds. Diego Marcon retraced the visual traces left by the artists who, forty years ago, made the history of Italian experimental cinema and by those who later contributed to the evolution of that language. It was not merely a close encounter with material—at times unknown to the artist, at others familiar, at others still an accomplice—but rather a process of absorbing it in order to then abdicate it in favor of a personal speculative operation. Letting something detach from a background to bring it to the surface, one made mostly of celluloid, glue, inks, scratches.
Franti has no body, no face. He is, if anything, a character, tough and grim (Edmondo De Amicis cit.) whose vice or virtue is established “out of place” and “off screen.”
At the heart of the exhibition, four films conceived as a single cerebral hemisphere—four collapses, four impulsive acts painted on tiny, reddish centimeters of film.
(Untitled - Head falling 01;02;04;05 – 2015).

Other elements orbit around the films, contributing to a sequence of visual and sound cues. An outdoor sculpture, resembling a garden gnome but in extra-large format, marks the space-time of a scene in which we are invited to move without the aid of signs, maps, compasses, or North Stars.

This exhibition is especially dedicated to elementary school children, who are between nine and thirteen years old, and it could be titled: Mostra d'un anno, fatta da un alunno di terza d'una scuola municipale d'Italia. Now look at this exhibition, kids: I hope you’ll enjoy it and that it will do you good.

The exhibition is produced with the technical collaboration of:
La Camera Ottica, Università degli Studi di Udine / DAMS Gorizia
Home Movies - Archivio Nazionale del Film di Famiglia
Recording and 16mm development:
Marco Emiliani
Technical coordination:
Mirco Santi

Special thanks to:
Basma Alsharif & Ben Russell
Michele Bazzana & Paola Pasquaretta
ExElettrofonica – Roma
La Fucina di Efesto – Milano
Mercante S.r.l. – Gorla Minore

Particular thanks to Luisa Miriam Ferrario and Roberto Iasiuolo for their generous support of the exhibition.