Night in the gallery
‘The thousand and one nights’ project
November 11, 2022
Castello925 Venice
Works by Kaethe Kauffman
Group moderator Luca Caldironi
On November 11th, after several years of activity, in the space of the Castello925 gallery, Luca Caldironi mediated and organized the experience ‘a night in the gallery’ with the artworks of artist Kaethe Kauffman. The experience is part of the project ‘The thousand and one nights’.
The meeting of the participants took place in an in-formal way. From the very beginning, it has been left space for sharing the emotional motivations that each person brought with them and the fantasies that supported them. It was not, therefore, an introduction in classical form, but rather a moment that allowed for the expression of those personal elements in which each person could recognize themselves and which they felt were characteristic for expressing their own personality.
Thus, a way was created to immediately interweave individual and group experiences through their own private symbology.
Evocative was the date. November 11th is, in fact, St. Martin’s Day, whose origin is Christian, but whose meaning goes beyond religion. The secular possibility of talking about the ‘gift’, the ability to give something of oneself to the Other, an Other with capital O as representative of the encounter with otherness in its broadest sense. An otherness that involves not only the relationship with people and with each other, but also with one’s own inner parts, not surprisingly, the conversations went on talking about ‘dreams’, both the dreams of the night and dreams of wakefulness.
But let us proceed step by step! After this first stage, a certain ‘sensory’ or ‘taste property’ could not be excluded. Eating together expressed the value that emotional nourishment could not neglect, that of the body!
Returning the mind to the body, T. Ogden reminds us event better ‘Re-Minding the Body’, which allows us to play with the meanings of the verb: re-mind, ‘to remind someone of something’, ‘to provide a new mind’, ‘to take care’!
Then, restarting from the ‘container’-gallery, a deepening of the meeting was resumed in anticipation of the night. The themes continued to be that of the ‘gift’ and ‘for-giving’ and for this purpose some literary traces were used such as J. Borges and his tale of Cain and Abel, a ‘secret companion’ of the participants – Conrad would say. Again, the encounter with the other offered that useful disorientation in which, or rather ‘though which’ memories could con-fuse.
Once the mattresses were laid out and the blankets arranged, participants slept under Kaethe Kauffman’s works that like totems protected and ruled their dreams.
The following morning, over a cup of tea, the guests once again shared their experiences regarding the activity, with a special focus on dreams. Given the topic and its privateness, we cannot go into it any further, but the more general notes that emerged among the participants can be referred to a ‘sense of security’, a ‘non-invasive’ sharing of space and the fact that the different perspective of observation, both of one’s own thoughts and of the exhibited works, led to a fruitful regression that opened new dimensions of meaning and worldviews.
Given the value of this experience and the positive feedback provided, Castello925 gallery is committed to organize and propose it again with other artists and those interested in the project.