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Fondazione Sandretto Re Rebaudengo presents I Saw a Dark Cloud Rise, <\/em>a solo exhibition by Alessandra Ferrini that proposes a meditation on the interconnections between imagination, technology and ideology. It emerges from the artist\u2019s long-term research on the legacies of the colonial violence perpetrated during the Italian occupation of Libya. At the same time, it puts forward a series of open questions and lines of inquiry that form the basis of a new research on the genealogy of Fascist technological fantasies and their genocidal drive.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I Saw a Dark Cloud Rise<\/em> unfolds over two rooms and revolves around a three-channel video installation by the same title,which was commissioned and produced by Fondazione Sandretto Re Rebaudengo. The first room, a reading room conceived by the artist as a \u201cdecompression space\u201d, allows for the materials employed in the video installation to be expanded, connected, and contextualised through a series of diagrams and reading materials.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In the second room, the work I Saw a Dark Cloud Rise<\/em> investigates the interplay between imagination, technologies of vision and warfare, propaganda and historical imagery, in shaping how notions of progress and conflict are understood and deployed to affirm a collective imperialist agenda and imaginary. It evokes a series of reflections on the centrality of coloniality within Western practices of looking and visualisation, as well as in the formation of collective desires and aspirations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The exhibition focuses on the often-overlooked years before World War I, specifically, the Italo-Turkish War of 1911-12 that resulted in the Italian colonial occupation of Libya. This conflict marked the first use of aircraft and aerial bombing in military history and the development of new, martial uses of wireless technology. The war in Libya and the year 1911 \u2013 the 50th anniversary of Italian unification - are crucial to assess the way the Italian liberal nationalist ideology, built onto the myth of Risorgimento, created the conditions for the emergence of Fascism. On the other hand, it brings to light the international, violent repercussions of this ideology, which led to the onset of World War I and the development of new genocidal technologies to control and annihilate colonial subjects.<\/p>\n\n\n\n By highlighting the impact of the Italo-Turkish War on the development of Futurism and Fascist ideology and aesthetics, the exhibition questions how technology has been mythologised, sacralised, and memorialised. Framing these considerations is a reflection on the power of images and desire in shaping imagination and, consequently, politics. On the other hand, Ferrini proposes recalibrating this imaginal constellation to foster liberatory practices.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I Saw a Dark Cloud Rise <\/em>was prompted by the artist\u2019s visit to the Sanctuary of Oropa, in the province of Biella (Italy). Dedicated to the Black Virgin of Oropa, it sits on a mountainside, overlooking a valley. Here, a commemorative plaque dedicated to Guglielmo Marconi and erected by the Fascist regime, claims that wireless technology had an almost divine origin: it came to Marconi as he contemplated the valley from this vantage point. In addition, the sanctuary presents a collection of ex-voto artefacts that include a painting referring to the 1911 massacre of Shar al-Shatt, perpetrated by the Italians on the Libyan population, which triggered the first aerial bombing. From these two elements, Ferrini has developed a broader reflection on the \u201cview from above\u201d and what constitutes a distinctly Italian imperialist gaze. Focusing on the notion of \u2018white sight\u2019 put forward by Nicholas Mirzoeff, this project highlights the continuities of proto-Fascist ways of seeing and thinking, which keep shaping positivist understandings of progress and technology, as well as readings of Futurist and Rationalist art.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The exhibition represents the outcome of a long collaboration between the Foundation and the artist, developed since 2018 within the framework of different exhibitions and educational projects, often in dialogue with Turin-based organisations dedicated to safeguarding and enhancing historical and political awareness and memory, such as Biennale Democrazia, Polo del 900, Istoreto.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Fondazione Sandretto Re Rebaudengo presents I Saw a Dark Cloud Rise, a solo exhibition by Alessandra Ferrini that proposes a meditation on the interconnections between imagination, technology and ideology. 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