Varsi Art&Lab presents “Metamask,” the new project of the Roman collective Sbagliato.

The project brings together a series of screen printed works created in collaboration with 56Fili within the Varsi Lab in which the architectural sample is once again the basis of Sbagliato’s visual research.

The same concept applies to “Metamask”, which takes its cue from a series of elements belonging to the National Roman Museum of the Baths of Diocletian, and in particular from three masks located in the cloister of S. Maria degli Angeli, more commonly known as the Michelangelo cloister. The artists superimpose these masks with the intention of merging the various characters or personalities of the ancient theater.

Sbagliato’s aim is to dialogue with our cultural tradition, and to analyze and reinvent it, thus making it their own. This creative transmission process involves a series of operations that wish to enhance the enormous and priceless artistic heritage Italians have inherited. Their intent is also to draw new generations to it, making it accessible to the general public.

The use of the masks from the Museum of the Baths of Diocletian is a reference to a major theme in the contemporary world: in our complex and stratified society, it seems to be necessary to wear a thousand faces in order to live with others, but above all with oneself. In his work, Luigi Pirandello, the great master of psychological relativism, reminded us admirably of this notion.

The mask is a powerful metaphor of the link between art and psychology, of the condition of the postmodern man who lives in a society governed by laws, conventions and habits independent from his will, and to which he must always try to adapt. In our society, we can no longer afford to wear only one mask at a time, but we need several together.