On October 14th, 2016, Galleria Varsi presents Vertigine [Vertigo], an exhibition by SBAGLIATO, a group of three Roman architects and designers who have braved the existing architectural order, arbitrarily transforming its codes through posters or signs, thus creating unexpected “gaps” in the city.
Doing “heterotopias”, or opening doors on an otherness, has always been a need for SBAGLIATO, who with their visionary work have gone beyond the limits imposed by matter, and have opened symbolic fractures in the urban context, inviting viewers to look at what is inside and beyond it: the void.
But is it possible to experience the void?
Vertigine stems from this question, a title that on one hand recalls architecture and its “heights”, and on the other man and his feelings.
The exhibition is an extension of SBAGLIATO’s research on the distortion of perceptions in public spaces, but this time it investigates the architectural symbol of ascension: the staircase related to space and to individuals. The rise from the earth has always been a primal need for all civilizations, made explicit in time through the development of symbolic and building systems.
Through the creation of a large labyrinthine installation and a series of drawings and photographic works, SBAGLIATO has warped the spaces of Galleria Varsi, breaking the laws of perspective and of vision, in order to make the viewer feel the void and trigger all possible reactions and instincts related to it.
The void is manifested in all its forms. The notion of absence, in relation to a staircase, seems to embody the legacy of a door; it attracts the viewer inside, making the vacuum become a possibility.
We can choose to cross its threshold, follow it to the summit, to infinity; or to remain suspended, paralyzed by fear, or again to drop into the depths of its abyss. We can decide to flee or surrender to vertigo and jump.