Skip to content

Cecilia Mentasti

A Place to Stay by Cecilia Mentasti, Installation view of the exhibition A Place to Stay curated by Marta Cereda and Laura Lamonea, Careof, 2024, Ph. ©Francesco Paleari

In continuity with the work of flanking and intermediation that Video Sound Art carries out to support new artistic productions, thanks to the contribution of MiC and SIAE, as part of the “For Those Who Create” program, since February 2024 the production centre has been engaged in the construction of the work A Place to Stay by artist Cecilia Mentasti.

Nine months of development of this ambitious project returned us to an audio installation, a photographic project and a publication that converge in the exhibition A place to stay curated by Marta Cereda (Curator and co-director of Careof) and Laura Lamonea (Artistic Director of VSA), programmed from October 10 to November 1, 2024, in the spaces of Careof.

The project is accompanied by a catalog published by the historic publishing house Corraini Edizioni, with contributions by Marta Cereda, Davide Colombo, Laura Lamonea and Giulia Zompa. On the occasion of the 20th edition of Giornata del Contemporaneo, on the morning of Saturday, October 12, Careof hosted the presentation of the catalog with the presence of the artist and the authors.

A Place to Stay by Cecilia Mentasti, Installation view of the exhibition A Place to Stay curated by Marta Cereda and Laura Lamonea, Careof, 2024, Ph. ©Francesco Paleari

The work consists of a selection of 200 stories of Italian artists, women and men, told to 200 dogs, which we find photographed and portrayed in the exhibition. The research has seen Cecilia Mentasti (Varese, 1993) digging deep into libraries and archives, among them the Library of the National Gallery of Modern Art in Rome, the ASAC Archive of the Venice Biennale and in Milan those of the State University and Careof.
The artist makes a personal rewriting of art history, selecting little-known works and sometimes reconsidering the role of figures traditionally neglected or outside traditional art circuits.
What is art today and what role should it play in society? The dog, a recurring presence in art history – devotional icon and witness to social transformations – seems to be the right recipient of this question. The artist/dog listening association is a not insignificant step in the communicative process: if the tragic story of Francesco Lo Savio immediately seemed close to the elderly Isotta’s sensibility, Laura Grisi is the perfect artist for the lively Ambra, particularly for that work in which the wind whips at 40 knots in a room. Cecilia Mentasti’s dogs invite us to experience a more instinctive, deep and empathetic love for art.

A Place to Stay by Cecilia Mentasti, Installation view of the exhibition A Place to Stay curated by Marta Cereda and Laura Lamonea, Careof, 2024, Ph. ©Francesco Paleari

PROGRAM

The exhibition will be open from 10 October to 1 November 2024
Opening: Wednesday 9 October, h 19:00 – 21:00
Opening hours: h 15:00 – 19:00
Free entrance
Careof, Fabbrica del Vapore, via Giulio Cesare Procaccini, 4, Milan

Presentation of the publication A Place to Stay, published by Corraini Edizioni
Saturday 12 October, h 11:00
Free entrance
Park between via Messina, via Luigi Nono and Fabbrica del Vapore

A Place to Stay by Cecilia Mentasti, Ph. Diego Mayon, 2024

Supported by the Mic and SIAE as part of the ‘Chi Crea’ programme.

A Place to Stay
by Cecilia Mentasti

10 October – 1 November 2024

Opening hours
h 15:00 – 19:00

Opening
Wednesday October 9, h 19:00 – 21:00

Venue
Careof, Fabbrica del Vapore
via Giulio Cesare Procaccini, 4, Milano

Free entrance

Production by Video Sound Art

Curated by Marta Cereda and Laura Lamonea
Project manager: Laura Lamonea
Visual identity: Alessio D’Ellena (Superness)
Sound production consultancy: Painé Cuadrelli
Production: Lino Palena
Communication and development:
Francesca Mainardi
Caterina Migliore, Federica Torgano

Pubblication by Corraini Edizioni

Curated by: Marta Cereda and Laura Lamonea
Book design: Alessio D’Ellena (Superness)
Volume coordination: Marta Cereda
Texts edited by: Marta Cereda, Davide Colombo
Laura Lamonea, Giulia Zompa
Translations by: Giacomo Raffaelli – FluentFrame
Photographs by: Cecilia Mentasti

Supported by
MiC e di SIAE,
as part of the ‘Chi Crea’ programme.

Special thanks to
Carlos Manuel Gasparotto