Premio Combat Prize

This work is part of a series that addresses scientific representations and visualisation strategies challenging them to account for aspects of the human nature that escape quantification and rationalisation. Fragments of brainwaves taken during peculiar moments of the imaginative consciousness are blown up and reproduced into acrylic glass shapes, whose transparency, reflectivenesss and fluorescent glow bring them back to the sphere of perception.
Dream Is the Gap between What We Know and What We See focuses on the extraordinarily intense imaginative activity EEGs record in the instancts following when we shut our eyes (alpha squeaks and eye blinks). The track presents emphatic ups and downs as the subject repeatedly opens and shuts his eyes in a series of blinks. Too intense to be of use to scientists trying to establish a standard, they are normally discarded form calculations. However, they allow the artwork to attempt to frame, track and articulate that space of vision in between us looking outwards (at our surroundings) and looking inwards (into our mind and repository of imagery). The fragments of EEG in this work draw the boundaries of a space in between what is physical and what is mental, set apart merely by the thin membrane of our eyelids separating two opposite worlds.
The piece points at the dichotomy the Millennial generation constantly lives with: split between actions they have pursued following models and promises from the past generation and a continuous precariousness that invalidates them, handicaps their ability to follow a constructive trajectory, forces on them the need to be nomadic, to continuously readapt and reinvent themselves. At the fracture between felt potential and perceived fragmentation, the work looks at mental phenomena such as dream, fancy and imagination. Can the pure play of thoughts and images - as opposed to the daily toil of productivity and consumption - provide us with a method of dissent? Can it offer us an unprecedented resource to know our surroundings? A Creative mode of action on our present?
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Maria Teresa Ortoleva is an Italian artist based in London and represented by Luca Tommasi, Milan. From her research-based practice on the cognitive value of imagination, she develops exhibition projects, interdisciplinary collaborations, site-specific commissions, public participation and education projects. She currently is part of the London Creative Network at Space, London, receiving support funded by the European Union for the development of a new project.
Selected CV:
SOLO EXHIBITIONS
2018
Rêverie, Luca Tommasi, Milano
2016
Triumphus Visionis, Fondazione Arnaldo Pomodoro, Milano
EXHIBITIONS AND PRESENTATIONS
2020
Ventura Projects, Milan Design Week, Salone del Mobile, Milano (forthcoming)
2019
Bocconi Art Gallery 2019, Bocconi University of Milano (forthcoming)
A misura d’uomo - Tribute to Leonardo, Luca Tommasi, Milano
The Nomenclature of Colours, The Slade Research Centre, UCL, London
2018
Premio CRAMUM 2018, Villa Bagatti Valsecchi, Varedo (MB)
Contexto 2018, Casa Testori, c/o Edolo (BS)
Contribution to d/UMP, Test Space Spike Island, Bristol
2017
Premio Cairo 2017, Palazzo Reale, Milano
ArtVerona art fair, Luca Tommasi, Milano
E la luce fu. Premio San Fedele 2017, Galleria San Fedele, Milano
2016
Creative Energy, Palazzo Regione Lombardia, Milano,
Research presentation, University of Milano Bicocca (UniMiB), Milano
Research Seminar on Bruno Munari, University of West London (UWL)
2015
Triumphus Visionis, Università Cattolica UCSC di Milano, site specific commission for the Stair of Honour, for ExpoMilano 2015. Presented at the Vatican Pavillion at Expo, Milano
Memory and Failure, Drawing Room, London
Signature Art Prize Gala and Awards, Degree Art, London, UK
2014
ACTION : SPACE, Fondazione Rivolidue, Milano
Christie’s Multiplied Art Fair, Christie’s, London
Slade MA/MFA Fine Art Degree Show, The Slade School of Fine Art, UCL, London
MA and Other Postgraduates, Atkinson Gallery, Somerset
2013
Response-Call-Response, Arcade, London
Leverhulme Arts Scholars, Wysing Arts Centre, Cambridge
ACADEMIC QUALIFICATIONS
2014
MA (Distinction) Fine Arts, The Slade School of Fine Art, UCL, London
2012
BA (Honours) Fine Arts, Accademia di Belle Arti di Brera, Milano
AWARDS AND RESIDENCIES
2019
European Regional Development Fund for project development with London Creative Network, Space, London
2018
Special Award Ventura Projects for CRAMUM 2018, Ventura Projects
2nd prize Premio CRAMUM 2018
2017
Finalist Premio Cairo 2017, Cairo Editore, Milano
Finalist Premio San Fedele 2017, Galleria San Fedele, Milano
2015
Finalist Signature Art Prize, London
2013
Leverhulme Arts Scholarship for artists residency at Wysing Arts Centre, Cambridge
2012
Gay Clifford Award for Outstanding Women Students, UCL, London
Incentive Award for Art Research (III edition), Brera Academy of Fine Arts, Milano
2011
Incentive Award for Art Research (II edition), Brera Academy of Fine Arts, Milano
Honorable Mention National Competition for Art Research, Società Umanitaria, Milano