Dear Research Diary,

Yesterday I read a chapter on Giovanni Anselmo following professor Dohna’s advice of taking a good look at a couple of artworks and trying to figure out how each artist individually fits into the movement. The opening part said that Arte Povera did not in reality have a manifesto, Celant’s work is only considered that way in the light of its context in the avant-garde form. In reality they were only essays for exhibitions which served the purpose of a traditional manifesto by outlining basic trends that unify the movement as a whole. Anselmo fits into the category of somebody who deals with the thread of the natural and the artificial and the invisibility of natural forces within consumer society and the world of production. His most notable works are Scultura che mangia, Senza Titolo (plexiglass and iron bar) and Torsione which all embody the forces of nature which help the artist, and therefore he considers them “materials” in his work. 

Senza Titolo, the rock shows potential energy, gravity will be shown if it falls.

Dear Research Diary,

My trip went well and was semi-related to my thesis, in a very broad way. I was visiting Manifesta 8 “Dialogue with Northern Africa.” Everything was basically video art. It was pretty nice, actually not related at all, nevermind. Meanwhile I got responses from professor Gianni and professor Dohna saying they would read my work and comment on it. I think I am meeting tomorrow with professor Gianni and we can talk about what I wrote as well as my plans for the future, the remaining three weeks here and during the winter break when I will be back in the USA. I already know there is a show about Pistoletto in the Philadelphia Museum of Art which I can’t miss. It’s curated by the new director of the MAXXI so there should be some good pieces there. I need to spend this entire week catching up on work from Thanksgiving work, so I’ll try to place some more readings and summaries where I can fit them. I would also like to conduct an interview at some time before the semester ends, either with a gallerist at L’Attico or someone who was involved in the AP scene, but it might be difficult to schedule with finals coming up. I also need to conquer my own library for this course and I think I will make that the archive of L’Attico since they definitely have lots of things which I must read. I’ll try to plan that for either this weekend or next week since we have Wednesday off of school. I’m so stressed with all the papers I need to write now and the short time until winter break I hope I don’t get sick from it all!!!!!!

Dear Research Diary,

I am not going to be able to write for the next week because I am going on vacation. I will be spending some time in Murcia to see Manifesta 8 so it is very useful time. I will not have a computer or internet access. I think I lost some entries, they are not here, they disappeared, I don’t know what is happening. Unfortunately I will not be in class today because I thought my plane left later than it does. See you next week.

Dear Research Diary.

I spent the whole morning yesterday at Palazzo Venezia reading a bunch of books about Arte Povera. I read the book Forme per il David that professor Dohna recommended for me, but I didn’t really understand why she asked me to read it. It just talks a lot about Michelangelo but not a lot about any of the Arte Povera artists. Anyway. I wrote the essay about how the theories behind Arte Povera were incarnated and how it came to be, I am pretty unsure about it because I had to make up a lot of it off the top of my head. I still have a lot of work to do and every time I meet with professors I just have more and more work and it never ends. I’m scared about these next couple of weeks because I need to dedicate them to classes and finals, I will have about a million papers to write and I will not be able to keep up with these thesis papers at the rate that I am going now.

Dear Research Diary,

Today we had an inspiring lecture from Professor Smyth. She spoke about her research in Norther Italian Renaissance art, particularly that of Coreggio and Pordenone. Her research has involved quite a bit of difficulty, since most of the period writings are in Latin or Italian dialect. Also, Pordenone’s frescoes have disappeared since they were frescoes in the humid Venetian lagoon. Hse used the same tools of reconstruction for this project however as she did in Coreggio’s Parma Cathedral when she mapped out who would have seen which parts of the apse, therefore understanding fully what the patrons meant to achieve.

This is probably a good lecture to remember as a consolation since I wont have to battle with nearly illegible Latin. 

Dear Research Diary,

I am having trouble completing Dohna’s assignment. I don’t feel like I have any sources and so it is difficult for me to write a lot based on mere opinion. I should have done it by now but I feel that I really need to go to Palazzo Venezia and read the book she recommended. Will definitely do that on Friday. I’ll get there early and bring my laptop and devote that to answering that and Pr. Gianni’s new questions. Those are basically to pick one or two works by each artist and then compare them to try to help answering why it is considered a movement. That’s pretty easy, but I still need to tell her about my new idea to focus just on Rome. 

Dear Research Diary,

I had a great day. I met with Ilaria Gianni and we discussed the paper I wrote for her and she said it was great. Then we talked a little about the fact that Celant, unlike Tzara, Breton, or Marinetti who were artists themselves and drafted manifestoes for the avant-gardes, Celant was an outsider. This probably contributes a great deal to its difference in regards to the other movements of the 20^th century as well as of course, it’s 60’s time frame after the economic boom and the age of isolation.

Later I met with Professor Capoferri. We talked about Pasolini and how if I think something is Pasoliniano but they refuse to acknowledge his influence, it probably was because everyone hated him for being gay and were embarrassed about him until the 80’s, 5 years after his death! We talked about his participation in the warehouse in Turin when all the artists decided to leave after inviting him to talk. I also thought of a new idea, in order to compress my thesis as well as having a better question what if I focus just on the Roman scene! This would just be Pascali, Kounellis, and Boetti but I would be able to see the difference in their practice when compared to the Northern artists who didn’t have the influences of Twombly or Sonnabend.

Later I went to the galleria Federica Schiavo where I got an internship. Cool!

Then, I read the first chapter of Guy Debord’s Society of Spectacle and my mind was blown! This is almost as cool as when I read McLuhan’s The Medium is the Massage. Anyway, if every day was like this I would be really cool.

Oh hey guys