Galleria Nazionale D'arte Moderna Rome: Alfredo Pirri-Shay Frisch.

                            Galleria Nazionale D'Arte Moderna www.gnam.beniculturali.it/

While visiting Rome I decided to go and see the Galleria Nazionale D'Arte Moderna I was very surprised by the variety and high quality of contemporary art I saw on show in this gem of a Museum.

First of all if you are a tourist visiting the museum I strongly advise you to take n.3 or n.19 tram which stops in front of the museum as it's not a 15 minute walk to the museum from Piazza del Popolo as some people say when it's dark I wouldn't advise tourists to walk through the park Villa Borghese late in the afternoon in winter, especially if you are going on your own, it's much better in full delight where there other people around in the summer. Also I have read on some websites that the National Gallery of Modern Art doesn't have a cafe', this is actually incorrect. The cafe' is not inside the museum but you have to go out outside and walk to the back of the museum where it is located, beautiful in the summer but not to sure in the winter I guess it's ok.

While entering the building pass security I was transported straight away into a different space. I kind of left the present space I was in and the traffic of Rome and went into an altered space thanks to the work of the Italian artist Alfredo Pirri (born 1957 lives and works in Rome) and his artwork titled Passi (Steps) I literally stepped into the art work as it is made of wide broken glass and I was braking it even further by walking on it so that I could reach on foot the main exhibition area, I was basically forced to do it as there was no other way to reach the exhibition area.                                                

  

Alfredo Pirri, Passi.

I thought this was great fun,  to be able as a visitor to participate in the art work and be able to change the structure of the artwork by walking on it so by breaking even further the glass I was walking on, permanently changing the image of the art work and the vision of it, the image and the memory of it, so that really there is never a final image as the artwork gets constantly cracked by visitors.
As a viewer I didn't see any separation from myself and the art work I did not feel separated as one might look at an image from a still point of view at a distance I also felt unsure walking on it at how much further I was breaking the image and the artwork but excited that with my movement I was producing a further alteration to the art work. The breaking of the glass made met think also at the fragility of life itself and at how things both in real life and in art are constantly changing.
When I reached the main exhibition area I turned and looked back at the art work  & felt like I had just been through some sort of mental portal, this was given by the artist counterpointing the stylish shiny squares of broken glass with stylised white statues, white walls & columns. Because of this I felt like had been enveloped in an ever changing defined altered space. He basically made the best of the space that was already there and the artwork worked really well in this wide important space and it wasn't finished there...

I was initially supposed to see the Paul Klee exhibition but the permanent collection on the ground floor and other floors was so good that I lost track of time so I kept wondering around from room to room and then by mistake I ended up viewing first Shay Frisch's work on the second floor before Paul Klee's work.

                                                   Shay Frisch Peri, Campo 100535 B/N

Shay Frisch Peri is an Israeli artist &  Industrial designer that works and lives in Rome.

He works with light & space. The first work I saw  geometrical in form enclosed in a geometrical white tower inside it was black with an orange bright light going through the work and for me far to claustrophobic but the strong geometrical form and black (darkness) and white (light) both of the outside and on on the inside made me think of a modern version of a church or a chapel so of a spiritual aspect of the art work. I moved quickly to the second room which felt more opened and I was faced by squares of light white adaptors. In this room the art works where made out of the same materials as in the first room. The work it's self is made of endlessly repeated electrical adaptors (the light is shown as volumetric thanks to the actual structure of the adaptors) like some form of light sculpture made out of geometrical forms squared or circles or completely white or completely black with bright orange light beaming from the art work in a linear way which made me think of a minimalist and a precise  controlled way of arranging the work. The light adaptors united together create a new reality, a different way of painting that takes into account architecture, light and space. I found the modern monochrome use of colours (light adaptors) and the juxtaposition of dark and light, spiritual like looking at the Rothko's paintings when I went to the Tate Modern, it was peaceful. The artist didn't force me to participate but to be an observer and to take whatever I wanted to take from the experience. I did wonder thought at how much did it cost to keep the beaming  light on all the time and would the artwork still function if it was made with out the light beaming through it? The answer is no it wouldn't work as the light added volume and changed the meaning of the whole artwork itself. Without the light  it would be like looking at an empty white or black surface even if it was made with adaptors which in itself gave depth to the work.

                                                    Shay Frisch Peri Campo 100535 B/N

                                                    Shay Frisch Peri Campo 10035 B/N