2501 e Aris. Shifting Surfaces

MAGMA gallery presents "Shifting Surfaces", the double solo show of 2501 (Milan, 1981) and Aris (Tuscany, 1978), opening during the Bologna Art Week, on Friday February 2^nd, at 6.30 pm.
Important names of Italian Urban Art, the two artists count many collaborations in the urban space and a common artistic path influenced by graffiti.
The typical figures of Aris and the linear approach of 2501 are combined and exalted within the exhibition, which showcases the most recent works by the two artists, created specifically for the event.
Moving surfaces, unstable, changeable: the title of the exhibition underlines the dynamism of their artistic research. The works created for "Shifting Surfaces" express, in spite of the chromatic essentiality, a constant compositional tension, a vital rhythm consisting on the continuity of gesture and sign.
The lines of 2501 symbolize an incessant weaving and writing on the material, whether it be ceramic, metal, canvas or paper, exalted for example by the superposition of layers of different materials and permeated by a timeless light that filters between the traces, between a sign and the other. A flow that becomes itself a supporting structure, rewriting new compositional architectures. Through both installations and murals, the research of 2501 has always focused on the relationship between art and the environment, looking for new expressive ways, paying great attention to performance, not just to the result. This is how parallel projects are created, such as "Nomadic Experiment" and "Glimpse of America", where acting, doing, becomes the creative hub itself.
In the works of Aris, the surreal figures, recognizable thanks to enigmatic profiles, seem to have a liquid nature, capable of continually changing, amalgamating themselves in new shapes and colors. His artistic research is focused on materials and places, very often suburban and abandoned spaces, where the landscape is the result of urban stratification and the passage of man. A stratification that is found in his works on canvas and paper, where spray, tempera, markers are superimposed to create new surfaces above existing ones, underlining their mutability over time. A game of silhouettes that recall the agglomerations of human figures, emerge from undefined backgrounds, a set of plots that represent these different steps on the surface.
In "Shifting Surfaces", moreover, the works of the two artists dialogue with the MAGMA gallery spaces, going to change the perception of the surfaces also thanks to the creation of site-specific installation within the project room, time to push the spectator to discover the architecture of space.
 
2501 (Jacopo Ceccarelli) has exhibited at prestigious institutions such as the Triennale di Milano, the MACRO of Rome, the Center for Contemporary Art Luigi Pecci in Prato, the Royal Palace of Caserta, the MAC of Lissone and the Museum for Urban Contemporary Art of Berlin. In 2013, he participated in "Back 2 Back to Biennale", an official satellite event of the 55th Venice Biennale. In 2009 he won the Street Art Award at the Metropolis Art Prize 2009 with the video "Mask", screened in Times Square, New York. Among the most important interventions of 2501 are those in Los Angeles, Miami, Sao Paulo, Milan, Rome, Detroit, Chicago, New York, Atlanta, Kiev.
 
Aris began his activity in 1993. He was one of the protagonists of the exhibition at the PAC in Milan, "Street Art, Sweet Art" in 2007, the first in Italy to officially consecrate, in a public museum institution, the street artist of the Milanese and Bolognese scene. In 2014 Aris, together with 2501 and other important names, took part in the exhibition "From Street to Art" at the Italian Cultural Institute of New York, aimed at establishing a dialogue between artistic avant-gardes and street art. The journey and the need to explore are fundamental parts of his life and his work, leading him to paint in various countries such as Spain, Germany, Poland, Russia and to realize numerous public works in spaces not traditionally devoted to art.
 

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