Artist: Alessandro Rabatti
FaceBank by Alessandro Rabatti at SUPER FUTURE
Alessandro Rabatti was born in 1969 in Florence. After graduating from the Istituto Statale d’Arte in Florence with a diploma in Graphic Arts, he has worked as illustrator for international editorial projects. Focusing on scientific drawing and archaeological reconstruction, he worked on many archaeological sites in the Mediterranean region with the most distinguished museums and archaeological parks in Italy.
Reconstructions realized by INKLINK Studio, a company co- founded by Alessandro Rabatti, have been published by publications like National Geographic. Recently he started a career as Creative and Art Director in the field of Graphic Design. In parallel, he’s running a personal artistic research on his own and Facebank, his latest series realized with a Digigraphic digital print system on Magnani paper with a golden effect foil applied through a delicate hot overlay process, which are being shown at the exhibition. A year ago he founded Lander Project, a Graphic Design studio based in Florence.
Interview with Alessandro Rabatti on Facebank:
“I am interested in the banknote as an object / symbol of the global economy and markets, not in the ‘political’ characters painted, and I am not interested to ridicule their appearance or comment their story. I just cut and superimposed details of faces depicted on banknotes between them as they are. Some added details, made with an effect ‘gold leaf’ enough to activate the collective imagination of the world of comics. The metaphors of all this are a free interpretation of the viewer.
In this moment the texture of the banknotes are the more frequent background for all of my ideas. It’s an ongoing research: a real response to the crisis. This is the second project that I realized looking at the paper notes. The ‘technical’ input that has generated Facebank was the discovery that the faces of Lincoln, Queen Elizabeth and Mao are built on an almost identical pattern, as a ‘superior’ project shared by the three worldwide markets Asia - America - Europe. The three portraits are drawn three quarters and this similarity allows the overlap between them. I had a metaphor of globalization of markets on hand to take advantage of.
Technically I scanned the details of the faces reproduced on banknotes and created a digital file in layers, a virtual collage with lots of colored paper to be cut and overlap. In addition to the original images of the banknotes, which I did not want to modify, I have only added elements of gold to highlight some minimal parts which are characteristic of the characters. So there is no original material, the composition can only be printed, and only tn this way they acquire value: as banknotes. I will try to print a few copies to escape inflation!
My feeling is that by now neither the central banks nor the experts in the world of finance know what can be the solution. So yes! All that remains is their attempt to seek help from the superheroes: They already saved the entertainment markets, bridge the lack of ideas that affects publishing and cinema, generate record box-office and bring the audience away from reality.”
photo by : Davide Bischeri / A&Dfotografia
Art Shows
- Bedford Gallery, Walnut Creek , CA: Jan. 10 - Mar. 20 2016
- California Center for the Arts, CA: May 19 - Aug. 14, 2016
- Huntsville Museum of Art, AL: Huntsville Museum of Art: Sept. 10 - Dec. 11, 2016
- Daura Gallery at Lynchburg College, VA: Jan. 12 - Mar. 18, 2017
- International Museum of Art and Science, TX: Apr. 15 - July 23, 2017
- Yellowstone Art Museum, Billings, MT: Aug. 24, 2017 - Jan. 2, 2018
- Kalamazoo Institute of Arts, Kalamazoo, MI: Feb. 3 - May, 15 2018
- South Dakota Art Museum, Brookings, SD: Jun. 12 - Oct. 2, 2018
- Nuclear Science Museum; New Jersey; or University of Arizona Museum of Art: Nov. - Dec. 2018
SUPER FUTURE
January 11 - March 12, 2017
daily 11am- 8pm, at MAD Museum of Art & Design
10 Tanglin Road, #01- 01/#02 - 01, S247908
www.madmuseumsingapore.com
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