#1

Soundtrack 10+1

Dallas vs. Milan

Headphones

Wild Things

The Melancholy of
Modernity

Pills of Wisdom

L O NELY? DECEMBER'09/JANUARY'10

1
 EDITORIAL TEAM

DIRECTOR
Kiki Sideris
CHIEF EDITOR
Alix Doran
ART, CULTURE, INTERACTION EDITORS
Neri Bastiancich
Camilla Pietrabissa
Giovanni Saladino
MEDIA & ENTERTAINMENT EDITORS
Livia Andrea Piazza
Filippo Nava
PHOTOSPECTIVES EDITOR
Stephanie Serra
UPSIDE DOWN EDITOR
Sonia Fanoni
BLOG
Rosa Plijnaar
COMMUNICATION
Matteo Zanetti
Julia Westermann
Valia Xanthopoulou-Tsitsoni
Lorenzo Tubertini
FINANCES
Sofia Adamantopoulou

2
© Sonia Fanoni
 ISSUE #1
Alone in the dark
Loneliness can be interpreted in so many ways that, as a theme, it might scare for different reasons. It may seem
like such a broad term that one should narrow it down before even thinking about dealing with it, or it might simply
seem so vast and common to all of us that it is better left alone, a theme to be dealt with privately. It is a both an
extremely personal theme (the things that make us feel lonely are deeply connected to who we are and what we
expect from, or want to share with, others), but it simultaneously touches every single one of us (who can honestly
say they have never felt lonely?).
Precisely because it is personal but also common to all of us, what better way to talk about loneliness than through
articles related to a variety of themes, and involving the reader in different worlds and 'minds'? These articles will
give us the opportunity to reflect on other ways of interpreting loneliness, or other people's way of dealing with it.
But reading is also a moment for each and every one of us to be alone, to take the time to lock ourselves in our own
'bubble', and read about others. Our own loneliness becomes less present when we ourselves feel the presence, even
only on paper, of others feeling the same way we do. By retrieving ourselves from the surrounding agitation and
letting ourselves be absorbed by others' stories and adventures, we decide to be alone so we can think about how
not to be lonely.
Loneliness means different things to each of us, and also changes meaning over time. But as it is generally accepted
as a rather sad feeling, perhaps what matters more to us is how to deal with loneliness: the one that enables an
artist to create, the need to be alone to appreciate company, or even simply things that we would otherwise not
appreciate as much, loneliness that therefore also teaches us to appreciate what surrounds us... Loneliness may
emerge as a feeling that is not all negative and potentially destructive.
As we were preparing this issue, and as I was reading the articles published in the following pages, loneliness was
in fact not the feeling I felt. On the contrary. Even though it was the theme we were focusing on, I only witnessed a
willingness to get involved, to share, to communicate. And sharing with you what we have selected as lonely themes
and diverse approaches to deal with being lonely is perhaps, for us, our own way of dealing with our occasional
loneliness, and turn it into a productive process.
As loneliness is a universal feeling interpreted and dealt with in a variety of ways, the variety of articles included in
Issue#1 of BOB Magazine will I hope illustrate the different ways in which loneliness was interpreted by the authors
of the articles. This issue brings together diverse themes such as difficult break-ups, empty worlds and places,
isolated people and objects, but also hope. Hope that by expressing loneliness and accepting it, we can use lonely
moments to grow and find solutions.

BOB Issue#1 Alone In The Dark is not meant to be depressing for the reader! I personally even believe that you will
find energy and life in the articles published in the following pages.

As a last point before letting you read Alone In The Dark, I would simply like to introduce the new sections of BOB
Magazine. After Issue#0, so many ideas came to our minds that it was difficult to keep exactly the same sections
that had been created for the very first issue of BOB Magazine. Issue#1 therefore includes new sections that I hope
you will enjoy: Interaction is our new interview section, designed to let people express themselves freely; 10+1
invites you to sit down and listen to music while reading BOB Magazine; Editor's Choice offers space for an extra
article I will let you discover in your own time. And after all this, if you feel like reading more, we will not let you
down and feel lonely without BOB Magazine: We will regularly publish articles on the BOB Magazine blog!

And now... time to read!

-Alix Doran
CHIEF EDITOR
3
 CONTENTS

SOUNDTRACK
10+1 6
by Niccolò Bonazzon and
Filippo Nava

ART
The melancholy of modernity 10
by Julia Westermann

It's Sophie Calle:

Prenez soin de vous 12
by Giulia Rosso

OUR PHOTOSPECTIVES
Time just does not exist... 14
by Stephanie Serra

CULTURE
Artifacts:
Lonely pieces or parts of a whole? 26
by Sofia Adamantopoulou

Elle Muliarchyk:
Alone in a dressing room 28
by Francesca D'Ambrogio

UPSIDE DOWN
Dallas vs. Milan 30
by Sonia Fanoni

4
 MEDIA
34 The names of things following
those things into oblivion
by Andrea Parapini

36 Wild Things
by Marzia De Clercq

38 YOUR PHOTOSPECTIVES
by various contributors

ENTERTAINMENT
50 Headphones
by Gabriele Marino

52 Punks Wear Prada

by Alexandra Bode

INTERACTION
56 Several mistakes, some solutions
interview of Pesce Khete by Giovanni Saladino

58 Pills of wisdom
interview of Stefania Gerevini by Giovanni Saladino

EDITOR'S CHOICE
60 The Traveler: A lonely wanderer
by Gabriele Erba

5
 SOUNDTRACK
10 + 1

INSTRUCTIONS FOR USE:

Before reading this issue

1. Relax
2. Read over the following 10+1 tracks
3. Look for them at your nearest record store or
favorite online music source
4. Burn a CD or make a playlist on your media
player
5. Press play
6. Turn the page and
7. Enjoy the newest issue of BOB accompanied by
a lonely soundtrack

6
by Niccolò Bonazzon &
Filippo Nava

7
8
ART
We are continuously being exposed to
all kinds of art products; collections,
exhibitions, fairs, biennials, confer-
ences, and the list goes on. But what
do such experiences really give us?
How can we avoid just being passive
users and instead adopt a more in-
quisitive approach? Books, academic
journals, and university lectures can
help, but ultimately the most power-
ful tool we hold, is our individual abil-
ity to process the images that invade
our field of vision on a daily basis.
In this issue we will first 'Hopper' be-
tween Milan and Rotterdam. Then we
will see how Sophie Calle dealt with
a tough break-up.
9
 THE
MELANCHOLY
He is probably the most well-known American artist of
the beginning of the 20th century – Edward Hopper. Two
big European exhibitions are currently dedicated to him:
“Modern Life. Edward Hopper and his Time”, hosted at

OF
the Kunsthal Rotterdam, Netherlands, and the Milanese
exhibition “Edward Hopper”, at Palazzo Reale.
Two very different exhibitions: the former putting the
mature Hopper in the context of the diverse and contro-

MODERNITY versial tendencies of American Art of the early 20th cen-

by Julia Westermann
Edward Hopper, Self Portrait, 1925-1930. Öl auf Leinwand
64,1 x 52,4cm Whitney Museum of American Art, New York
Vermächtnis Josephine N. Hopper
tury. The latter focusing on the development of Hopper's
incomparable personal artistic style. But both portraying
an artist, who lived through the troublesome decades
of the beginning of the century, and who painted a sig-
nificant portrait of his time. Taking them together, they
give a complementary overview about Hopper and his
contemporaries.
Between Realism and Abstraction
In order to understand his work and the recurring
theme of loneliness, it is crucial to consider it against
the background of his time. In the United States, the
20th century was welcomed with great confidence. Peo-
ple believed a new world was coming, and that anything
was possible. Social, cultural, and economic changes
occurred. The modern American art, with its differing
tendencies, became a mirror image of the new era. Hop-
per’s view of everyday life is based on the Urban Realism
of the beginning of the century, a movement created
and centred around Robert Henri, Hopper’s teacher. The
Urban Realists were also called Ashcan School for their
inclination towards painting everyday life scenes, areas
with immigrants, public spaces. They refused the aes-
theticism and representative painting of the Gilded Age
and strived for a new form of Art.
On the other extreme there were the modernists re-
volving around Alfred Stieglitz. They avoided realism
and preferred abstract depictions of nature and architec-
ture. Even though controversial, both currents had the
same aim of renewing American art.
Hopper assumed his own position. He was not outside
but in-between these two poles. It is the effects of mo-
dernity that led him to putting the experience of alien-
ation and loneliness, the inability of individuals to get in
contact and the melancholy of existence at the center of
his work. Hopper was aware of the fundamental loneli-
ness of human beings. He did not care about describing
the surface and the obvious but rather the existence of a
deep, inner world and the profound nature of thoughts.
It was the relationship between things and ideas which
was at the basis of his paintings.
The view of the city
Hopper’s paintings of cities are, today, still considered

10
as symbols of large city life. They create enormous spa-
tial and psychological distances on a limited space. Hop-
per shows the inhabitants of cities mainly in depressing
and run-down areas. In contrast to the Ashcan School,
which considered the cities as dynamic places, full of
interaction and curiosities, for Hopper cities were time-
less, cold zones devoid of communication. From this
perception, he developed his own, distinctive style, dif-
ferent from all other tendencies of his age.
But – regardless of the beauty of his paintings – is this
negative perception of the city not limited? Does Hop-
per not forget the fact that cities can also bring people
together, as pointed out by the Urban Realists? Do his
paintings of men and women in anonymous spaces not Edward Hopper, South Carolina Morning, 1955. Öl auf Leinwand
neglect the positive impacts of the encounter of differ- 77.63 x 102.24cm Whitney Museum of American Art, New York
ent classes and cultures?
Paintings of alienation
Only in the 40s, art historians started to interpret Hop-
per’s art as an art of alienation, made manifest in his
paintings of cities. It became epitome of independence,
despair and existential loneliness, of sorrow for a lost
lifestyle. His figures in abandoned spaces seem to stand
their situation, but without any strength and goal. Hop-
per himself considered the “thing about loneliness” as
exaggerated. Instead, he deemed longing and melan-
choly as a normal circumstance of living in a community.
He considered it as necessary, even as positive and he
himself searched for loneliness. That is why he turned
away from the world and the art world, leading a seclud-
ed life, even though for 54 years he resided in the center
of New York’s Artist quarter – Washington Square.
Hopper accepted the natural isolation surrounding hu-
man beings. What he did not want to tolerate though is Edward Hopper, Morning Sun , 1952. Olio su tela, 71,44x101,93
cm, Columbus Museum of Art, Ohio; acquisizione dal Howald
the luxury of being unhappy. He was always searching Fund,
for new ways and solutions. And in the end, this is also
what happens to his characters. They face the twist of
fate with calmness. It is not the fateful but the individu-
ally chosen loneliness speaking from his paintings.
The two exhibitions are special in their own way. Nei-
ther of them is the typical Hopper exhibition revolving
merely around his theme of loneliness and surreal light.
Nevertheless, they both give a crucial contribution to re-
call a subject that is as valid today as it was a century
ago: the feeling of loneliness in human beings. And it is
this that makes the exhibitions particularly suitable for
cities such as Milan and Rotterdam.

Modern Life. Edward Hopper and his Time.

Kunsthal Rotterdam, 26.9.09-17.01.10

Edward Hopper,
Palazzo Reale Milano, 14.10.09-31.01.10
Edward Hopper, Seven A. M., 1948. Öl auf Leinwand, 76.68 x
101.92cm, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York
11
 IT'S SOPHIE CALLE:
PRENEZ SOIN DE VOUS*
by Giulia Rosso
Sophie Calle is French, born in 1953, and in recent
years has been the artist who has most marked concep-
tual and narrative arts. Her work wasn’t yet a structured
artistic project when she started stopping people on the
street, asking them to sleep in her bed in order to always
keep it alive, “comme ces usines où on ne met jamais la
clé sous la porte.” **
It was after some time, that the artist got to know that
one of those people she had invited was the wife of the
12
gallerist Bernard La Marche-Vadel, who,
after sleeping eight hours in Calle’s bed,
had asked her to participate in the XIth
Biennale de Paris.
First of all, I would like to specify that
this is not meant to be a review, but the
experiential diary of my first contact with
Sophie Calle’s works of art. To write about
arts one needs a really thorough knowl-
edge of the subject and, in my case, this
would flow into an unintentionally arro-
gant piece of writing.
Sophie Calle’s work is made of loneli-
nesses.
I discovered the artist’s work during
the “Prenez soin de vous” exhibition at
the Whitechapel gallery. With this same
installation, she represented France at
the Venice Biennale in 2007.
This is how it all started.
Calle receives an email from her boy-
friend who, by using a cynical language
for a bewilderingly seductive speech,
informs her that they will not be seeing
each other anymore.
She doesn’t answer to this piece of writ-
ing but she decides to take care of herself
by thinking about the artistic potential of
the circumstances. She asks 107 women,
chosen depending on their jobs, to un-
derstand it for her. Imagine the email be-
ing dissected by anthropologists, proof-
readers, primary school children, Indian
dancers, social workers, philosophers,
forensic psychologists, intelligence offi-
cers, target practice champions, accountants and nurs-
ery school teachers. They analysed, parsed, translated
until exhausting that letter, then returning their own in-
terpretations.
The outcome is very intense. The room is full of voices,
songs, stories and whisperings of pages being flicked
through. The letter was dissected, emptied out and reas-
sembled with its double and triple meanings. Each one
of the consulted women brought her taks to a close and
the artist shows the 'researchers' result' beside a video
of each of them reading the email.
One can catch Calle’s imprint through the composition
of the exhibition, characterised by the heterogeneity of
the media (texts, videos, photos), and by the complexity
of the materials, which works, as always with the artist,
as one of the distinctive features.
To assimilate this tangle of responses I started inves-
tigating the rooms, trying to reconstruct the identity of
each consulted actor, but most of all the integrity of the
letter and the face of the man who sent it. I got com-
pletely involved quickly, seduced by the invitation to en-
ter in this stranger's most private sphere. The short-cir-
cuit, triggered between the artist and the spectator, now
makes all these women cheer me up, and I find myself
accompanied: there is no loneliness anymore.
In the letter, the sender asks the artist to agree on
the fact that the need to break up is no more than the
mathematical result of a set of rules settled at the very
beginning of their relationship. By reading a few lines
we can imagine that the two lovers had
been distant and lonely for quite some
time, although they were still maintain-
ing the relationship. But, as a paradox,
the addressee was lonely before the let-
ter was written, more than she became
subsequently, after having twisted the
rules and unchained so many different
reactions, after having shifted roles
and identities and unveiled her life.
'Walking through' the voices I felt
this work of art as a salvation effort,
even if unusual, and I thought that
the entire puzzle prevents the woman
from feeling guilty and abandoned.
As for the mere theoretical side (more
linked to the conceptual dimension),
Sophie Calle renews, in this work, the
central theme of her artistic operations
through the complexity of the collec-
tion of information about intimacy, and
by unveiling herself through the most
private desires and fears, in a continu-
ous narrative research.
It’s an intense work, which changes
something in the visitor's self, and forc-
es him or her to reflect on this artist’s
work. If you still don’t know her, my
advice to you is to speed things up.
* take care of yourself
** Like one of those factories where
one never switches the light off
images:
© Patrícia Soley-Beltran 2009'
http://agendadecor.wordpress.com
13
PHOTOSPECTIVES
This is not a professional photographical output, but a
place to merge subjective points of view to build a more
objective one. So Be Objective! Look around. Images ev-
erywhere. We take pictures, we share them, exchange
them, stock them, look at them, forget about them and
pull them out of an old drawer to reminisce. In the era
of digitalization, photography has become a new game
where the objective can be pointed at anything, from the
most serious to the most futile subject. The freedom of a
quick “click” is sometimes abused so choices have to be
made in order for the images to start interacting and, by
speaking a common language, build a common sense.
First, in OUR PHOTOSPECTIVES, we will have a look at this
issue's theme through the lense of BOB's photo editor.
Then (pgs 38-47) we will experience the theme through
a selection of images submitted by YOU, the readers...

14
OUR PHOTOSPECTIVES
Time just does not exist...
15
16
 17
© Stephanie Serra
18
19
20
21
 22
Artwork by Rachel Labastie, Ailes, 2008
23
24
CUL-
TURE
Sometimes we take culture for
granted. People, history, tradi-
tions, dialogues, heritage. Oth-
er times, instead, an analytical
thought crosses our minds and
we stop and reflect. Be Objective
magazine offers this particular
space to just such reflections; en-
tering our everyday lives in order
to offer a glimpse into some com-
mon cultural encounters: trips we
went on, food we ate, urban cen-
ters we visited, old traditions we
rediscovered, senses of fashion
we express, and so on.
So let’s get started with a long
awaited visit to the new Acropolis
Museum and then have a look at
a high-fashion model who does it
all.
25
 ARTIFACTS:
"lonely" pieces or parts of a whole?
It was on the 20th June of 2009 that I watched through
web-broadcasting the official inauguration ceremony of
the New Acropolis Museum in Athens. But it was not
until the end of July that I had the opportunity to visit the
museum. My intention is not to get into details or make
any comments concerning either the opening ceremony
or the museum itself. I believe that the beauty and the
value of the monument are unquestionable. The fact
that the Acropolis is considered as one of the world’s
most important monuments, with a significant impact
on the cultural evolution of the human kind and on the
perception of western world’s identity, is indisputable.
The issue, therefore, that I want to raise, concerns my
thoughts that were triggered by this visit.
Immediately, the display of mutilated sculptures next
to the real antiquities, whose other halves are at the
British Museum in London, became food for my thought.
White-coloured plaster replicas depict the missing friezes
in the New Acropolis Museum. My impression was that
the way in which the artifacts were exhibited touched
upon the issue of the return of the Parthenon Marbles by
stressing their absence.
It was then that a series of questions developed in my
mind. Will the New Acropolis Museum mark the “reverse
Caryatids Erechtheion © Nikos Daniilidis
26
by Sofia Adamantopoulou
countdown” for the long-sought return of the Parthenon
Marbles? As a Greek, I wish to see the monument finally
unified in its original territory, since those marbles are
an integral part of the supreme monument of Classical
civilisation. At the same time though, a flurry of related
issues started to circulate in my head. Is the return
of the marbles of the same importance for the entire
world? What would be difference in displaying the
real antiquities in their original place? Why not place
the replicas in the British Museum and bring the real
antiquities to Athens? Had they not been taken away
from their territory, what would have been the evolution
of the marbles in terms of preservation? What kind of
contribution to the marbles as significant monument
does the British museum bring? What will be the future
of the British museum, if the marbles are finally returned
to Greece? And if they are returned to Greece, will other
major museums around the globe follow the pattern of
returning artifacts to their “original” place? Then, what
will be the picture of the world’s museum map? What will
be the implications for the museum system?
The issue is obviously complicated, broad, and
philosophical with ethical, legal, and political aspects.
The arts network is full of strands. Museums are places
Night view of the Parthenon Gallery
to educate, inform and entertain
the public, while at the same
time preserve artifacts for
coming generations. On the one
hand monuments are embedded
in the history, culture, identity,
and evolution of a nation or
civilisation. It is also expected
that a nation wants to preserve
the right to control the objects
and benefit from their monetary,
cultural, and historical value.
Consciously or unconsciously,
both the interpretation and
display of artifacts are used to
support or empower modern
nation-states. On the other hand,
there is the artifact’s history
itself. Can this displacement be
considered part of the history
and identity of the artifact, as
its historical evolution? Or is an
artifact necessarily embedded in
a territory? And, more generally
speaking, who actually owns
the Art, the Culture, and the
History? Who owns the Past? Is
it the nation where the artifact
was created or is it mankind in
general? Therefore, should art
be treated as a public good or
a root-identity issue? Finally,
a controversial point came to
my mind. Why does this issue
seem so problematic for the
archaeological monuments, but
does not strike so badly when
contemporary art is placed
elsewhere than in its production
territory? Is it at last because
in the past the borders, both
geographical and theoretical,
were strictly limited, while
nowadays globalization has
erased national borders and
unified the world?
In the end, perhaps, it is all
about where and how we place
ourselves on the cultural map
of our souls and of the world…
alone, and isolated, or as parts
of a whole.

The Archaic Gallery ©Nikos Daniilidis

27
 ELLE
MULIARCHYK:
ALONE IN A
DRESSING Discovered by the legendary French photographer Pat-
rick Demarchelier, Elle Muliarchyk is now one of the

ROOM most popular models all over the world. This gorgeous
strawberry blond girl, though, is not just a model: she
is also an incredible artist. She has made a name for
by Francesca D'Ambrogio herself with her guerrilla-style self-portraits taken in
high-fashion dressing rooms without the permission of
the boutiques. Actually her first face-to-face with her
art was very unusual. Everything started up when she
first photographed herself in a changing room of a nice
boutique in London. She was trying on a beautiful de-
signer dress that she couldn’t afford and she had her
camera with her. She decided to take a photo, because,
as she says in many interviews, “taking a photograph is
like owning the dress.” From that moment on, she has
kept on taking pictures in dressing rooms all over the
world. The decision of having her pictures taken exclu-
sively in changing rooms is brought by the nature of this
space, it is something that is not public but not exactly
private either, where everyone can strip both physically
and emotionally, trying on clothes as well as personae;
stepping into a dressing room is like stepping into dif-
ferent dimensions.
So what she does is walk in some of the most glam-
orous boutiques, take photographs of herself wearing
a selection of expensive clothes, posing for the shots,
adding props and lights to compose her pictures, and
then walk out of the store without buying anything. She
incorporates funny and bizarre objects in her pictures,
such as potted orchids, World War II gas masks, over-
sized teddy bears, including also naked dummies she

28
brings in the dressing rooms without being seen. Her
artistic work is for these reasons very “dangerous”, but
Elle is fearless. She usually has only minutes to man-
age this normally long act before getting caught by the
store attendants and getting kicked out of the store or
arrested by the police.
In “Alone Hermès” for instance, she lies on the floor
in a foetal position, wearing thousands-of-dollar worth
of silk rushed. Just seconds after capturing this image,
a sales assistant opens the door and Elle manages to
quickly hide her digital camera and tripod, explaining
her suspicious position to the speechless saleswoman
by saying that she had lost a contact.
Once she got arrested while trying on clothes in Gucci.
The sale assistants thought she was taking drugs, be-
cause each time they would walk into the dressing room,
she would be in different corners and in funny positions
hiding something, which was her camera.
Elle Muliarchyk came to NYC to become a supermodel
and is now an artist, who realised that modelling didn’t
allow her to express her own creativity and sense of
beauty. She was able to mix different kinds of arts, such
as fashion and photography, to create something totally
new. She is her own photographer, model, art director,
make-up artist and hair stylist. She can decide to be
whoever she desires at every moment and own those
outrageously unaffordable clothes, never having to pay
for them. She works by herself, for herself, but at the
same time she embodies the fantasy that everybody has,
making other people part of her work.

images: © Elle Muliarchyk

29
UPSIDE DOWN
Cutural exchange is such an abused concept in our globalized age. We read, study and hear about it,
often in very theoretical ways, but before all that, which is nevertheless of extreme importance, some-
times we should just notice the small episodes of exchange that are constantly occuring before our eyes.
The “exchange programs” in universities and schools are one such instance. So, this section is dedi-
cated to those who left, and those who came, those who turned their worlds upside down and agreed
to tell us how they did it. Chiara from Milan in currently in Dallas and Bart from Dallas is now in Milan.

Name: Barton

Surname: Peters

Country of origin: United States

Current location: Milan Italy

Reason of trip: Exchange student at Bocconi

as part of the ACME program

Duration of stay: 4 months August-December

Countries visited
in the past two years: Greece, China, France, Monaco, Italy

How do you recognize another I normally hear them before I see them,
American in Italy? normally it's them in a hurry or just recognizing
a voice when I'm not expecting to hear English

What is one Italian word that It's not really the words that can't be translated,
you cannot translate into its more like the ones that have multiple meanings
English, but use all the time? like "Die" (dai)

What have you learned from I enjoy being able to walk all over the city, Dallas is not
(or appreciated in) a walking city and you have to drive everywhere,
Italian “culture”? so its been nice to walk and use the public transportation.
It"s a nice change of pace and different lifestyle than Texas.

What makes you feel I've enjoyed eating Mexican food at Joe Pena's on via Savona.
at home in Italy? Gives me a little taste like the Tex/Mex food back in Dallas,
especially the guacamole.

For you, what does Memories.

loneliness go with? When I get lonely just think about
friends and family and good memories.

Please list a song, song- "I won't back down" Johnny Cash
a movie and a book movie- Big Fish
or quote that represent book- Ender's Game
loneliness to you.

30
 PSIDE DOWN
,ti tuoba raeh dna yduts ,daer eW .ega dezilabolg ruo ni tpecnoc desuba na hcus si egnahcxe larutuC
-emos ,ecnatropmi emertxe fo sselehtreven si hcihw ,taht lla erofeb tub ,syaw laciteroeht yrev ni netfo
.seye ruo erofeb gnirucco yltnatsnoc era taht egnahcxe fo sedosipe llams eht eciton tsuj dluohs ew semit
-ided si noitces siht ,oS .ecnatsni hcus eno era sloohcs dna seitisrevinu ni ”smargorp egnahcxe“ ehT
eerga dna nwod edispu sdlrow rieht denrut ohw esoht ,emac ohw esoht dna ,tfel ohw esoht ot detac
.naliM ni won si sallaD morf traB dna sallaD ni yltnerruc ni naliM morf araihC .ti did yeht woh su llet ot

Name: Chiara

Surname: Mammarella

Country of origin: Italy

Current location: Dallas

Reason of trip: Exchange Program

Duration of stay: 4 Months

Countries visited Australia (I lived there for 6 months),

in the past two years: Spain, Germany and Switzerland

How do you recognize another I would recognize them because they probably
Italian in America? wouldn't be wearing a T-shirt or shorts with the logo
of the university or of the fraternity/sorority!!!

What is one American word that

you cannot translate into AWESOME!!!
Italian, but use all the time?

What have you learned from Sometimes people bring cookies to class for everybody.
(or appreciated in) They do that often actually, and because I am allergic to gluten
American “culture”? they started bringing gluten free cookies and brownies...so lovely!!!
They make an enjoyable moment of the lesson.

What makes you feel I felt at home when in a house party some American guys put a song of
at home in America? Donatella Rettore A more recurrent feeling of home is when in
the supermarket I pass through the section of Italian wines.
There is a huge section dedicated to Italian brands!

For you, what does Museums (the majority of the times that I visit museums
loneliness go with? I am alone, but I like it that way, no pressure)

Please list a song, song- 'Sad sad city' Ghostland Observatory

a movie and a book movie- Catch Me If You Can
or quote that represent book- Mr. Wilson's Cabinet Of Wonder
loneliness to you.

31
32
MEDIA
Media is a pivotal term in our con-
temporary reality. From private rela-
tionships to public power, from pro-
duction to marketing, from cultural
production to cultural consumption,
media is constantly evolving and
modifying our behaviours, percep-
tions, lifestyles and expectations.
Appropriate reflections are neces-
sary. Through the eyes of its writers,
this section will follow the evolution
of media such as cinema, internet,
radio and publications.
First, Good will overcome Evil in Cor-
mac McCarthy's book 'The Road'. Then
the theme of loneliness is approached
by two very different films.
33
 "THE NAMES OF THINGS
FOLLOWING THOSE THINGS
INTO OBLIVION":
lone wanderings of father and son
by Andrea Parapini

Cormac McCarthy’s Border Trilogy (All The Pretty

Horses, The Crossing, Cities of the Pain) is all about re-
lationships: man to man relationships sometimes, but
more often between man and environment; a wild, hard,
and lifeless environment, where man is left alone with
himself and his thoughts. McCarthy’s characters are
usually defined by how they relate to what surrounds
them, rather than by the way they relate to others or
the things they do. Their approach to loneliness is their
main feature that we, as readers, can know. The only
one McCarthy gives us to try and understand each of
them. Their feelings are described not by words, but by
the landscape and the surroundings, not unlike many
classic western movies, like for example John Ford’s The
Searchers(1956). still from the film 'The Road'
McCarthy de-constructs this Western pre-concept; a
deconstruction already operated by Sergio Leone in the meaning well beyond their real goal. They know where
60s in his movies. McCarthy’s deconstruction is deeper they want to go, but it is usually clear that they can never
and more radical than Leone’s: there are no heroes, no get there because their real aim is more metaphysical
money to be made, no treasures to be found. But not than concrete.
unlike Leone’s heroes, McCarthy’s characters are alone, The Road, published years after the Border Trilogy, is
have few human contacts and, even when meeting some- the final destination of the author's exploration of loneli-
one, speak as little as possible. ness: the trip of the two protagonists has no real goal;
The great difference between the two is the peculiar they both just go 'South' to survive. Their trip is more
kinds of loneliness and their causes. Western heroes like an ideal, but they are McCarthy’s only two charac-
are alone for a specific reason: they were outlaws, lost ters able to reach their goal because it is the most meta-
someone, or are looking for something they are not will- physical, the need to save Good from Evil, but also the
ing to share with others, but ultimately they all want to most physical, the characters' own survival. Their loneli-
escape loneliness and re-join the community. ness is not their choice, or a real necessity: there is sim-
The characters of the Border Trilogy are alone by ply no other way to live for them. You either accept your
choice and, even when mingling with others, remain loneliness and just keep walking or die silently, as the
distant from the world that reminds of the ancient con- wife and mother do. Every possibility of human contact
temptu mundi. They wander around the West in search is rejected, simply because every other human being is a
of something, but their searches and wanderings have a cause of fear and threatens the others. Everyone has to

34
fight for his life and therefore has to stand alone to sur-
vive. Having grown in a lifeless world with no history and
no trustworthy human being, the boy has no knowledge
of Good and Evil. He, nonetheless, instinctively refuses
Evil, which is the only evidence that, on a sub-conscious
level, he distinguishes Evil from Good.
Their loneliness is more than an existential loneliness:
the world is a world with no past and no future, with no
hope or any opportunity of change. Only them, alone
in the middle of history, living in a non-existent world.
For the child there is no actual difference between what
has never been and what will never be. Both characters,
alone in the middle of time, of nowhere, without know-
ing what day and what year it is. But knowing all this
would be pointless for them as their relation to time is
just cold-hot, day-night and summer-winter. They can’t
see the sun, but only a pale ash-filtered post-nuclear
light. They are alone in the world: only them, their trip
and their struggle for survival.
Eventually, their trip reaches its goal: the most unex-
pected triumph of Good over Evil. How did they do it?
Why did they reach their goal while others have died or
lost brothers and friends? The Road, perhaps McCarthy's
http://www.flickr.com/photos/55357773@N00/2697400659
darkest, is a book about catastrophe where the goal is
reached simply by having the Good, the Fire, inside one-
self. Good is the only thing that allows one to escape
from loneliness and to be an existing and conscious part
of the world.
“We're going to be okay, aren’t we Papa?
- Yes. We are.
- And nothing bad is going to happen to us.
- That's right.
- Because we're carrying the fire.
- Yes. Because we're carrying the fire.”
The Road, published in 2006, is a novel by American writer
Cormac McCarthy. It is a post-apocalyptic tale of a journey
taken by a father and his young son over a period of sev-
eral months, across a landscape blasted by an unnamed
cataclysm that destroyed all civilization and, apparently,
almost all life on earth. The novel was awarded the 2007
Pulitzer Prize for Fiction.
35
 WILD THINGS
“You don't need human relationships to be happy, God
has placed it all around us.” As Christopher McCandless,
protagonist of Into the Wild(2007) -a movie based on a
true story- wrote this statement in his diary, he was al-
ready escaping from his ordinary life. With it, he thought
he had found the perfect remedy to his loneliness, a
loneliness generated not only by staying -or rather the
non-staying- with others, but mainly by all the things
that surrounded him.
Society for example, and all other kinds of human re-
lationships were perceived by Chris as simply boring co-
ercions.
Books, music and nature were the only things that
could answer his lonesome, existential questions. These
were things that satisfied his individual thirst of contact
36
By Marzia De Clercq
to the world, without, however, Chris ever perceiving the
need of dialoguing with the world.
Chris had just found his personal solution to the prob-
lem of human communication.
Living in this chaotic world, where interpersonal re-
lationships seem to be complex and the contemporary
annihilates the uniqueness of all single individuals: peo-
ple find themselves not only lonely and separated from
the others but also isolated when staying together with
them. They do not even find in the community itself an
appropriate interlocutor that actually cares about their
personal needs.
“Society, you're a crazy breed. I hope you’re not lonely
without me.”, sings Eddie Vedder in the soundtrack of
the movie, giving voice to Chris' inner feelings towards a
still from the film 'Into the Wild'
society that has to be alone without him. Sometimes, to
run away from solitude, we tend to hide in places where
we are enabled to better comprehend the world we are
living in: these could be parts of the world itself -even if
they are undefined and far away- or these can be part of
a certain parallel universe created specifically by people
looking for it in order to contrast it with their personal,
violent and wild emotions.
This is the case of the brand new movie of Spike
Jonze, Where the wild things are (2009), based on the
homonym children’s book by Maurice Sendak. Its pro-
tagonist, Max, a ten year old boy, lives together with his
mom and his older sister. Like all children, he needs to
be understood, but Max's questions remain unanswered
and therefore stir up chaotic behaviors to attract the at-
tention of his non-present family. Here, communication
seems to be, if not absent, ineffective and all the inter-
personal relationships constituting Max’s entire personal
universe are supported by messages, emotions, which
instead of reaching the other, remain unexpressed or,
better, repressed.
The feeling of solitude that touches Max is different
from the one bringing Christopher McCandless to flee
to the wild lands. Max’s concerns of loneliness are due
to his constrained childhood, during which he, however,
thinks he is being strong and wears his wild wolf dress; a
sort of imaginative refuge able to give him comfort when
he is faced with the far and distressing perspective of a
dying sun.
Max's emotions are as wild as his actions: he runs,
jumps and fights against fuzzy creatures- the Things.
His emotions find space and expression in the com- still from the film 'Where the Wild Things Are'
munity of gigantic and anthropomorphic Things, con-
sidered unconscious projections of all the unexpressed
fectly aware of all of his needs. This will confirm the
feelings Max doesn’t want to hide within himself, but
happy ending as Max's feelings of incomprehension fi-
wants to scream. The Things are therefore creatures
nally succeed in being both perceived and expressed.
Max fights, but are a representation of his emotions and
Two movies, two different ways of approaching loneli-
get expressed through the boy's actions.
ness, even if this loneliness results from a similar choice
These creatures or, better to say, these emotions per-
of escape. Nevertheless, in every case, if this feeling
ceived a lack of something, needed a guide, someone
is attributable to too many badly-said words or to the
who would be able to scream out all those misunder-
complete absence of communication, the result will not
stood thoughts and feelings, a king- as they say when
change: the ultimate freedom means finding yourself
they encounter Max- and therefore immediately crown
without anything, no limits or boundaries intended as
him.
people, objects and yes, also adversity. Extreme liberty
This former lack will later on be clarified by a clear, im-
corresponds to an absolute ease, that is not able to bring
mediate, and sincere howl that Carol, Max's monstrous
anywhere but to “a speeding up of times, of breaths, and
antagonist, addresses to the child. Carol understands,
of the natural beats of every single creature.” An authen-
through his simple gesture, his complete inability to
tic happiness, where real freedom is such only by shar-
speak about the primary need for a voice, a presence
ing all those limits with someone else.
able to express those repressed feelings, the need for
In the end, Christopher McCandless, writing in his
Max's presence as king. After the howling, however, all
personal copy of Leo Tolstoy's Family Happiness (1859),
seems to result in a failure for social beings, because of
will recognize the same idea that happiness is only real
the natural difficulty of communication.
when it is shared.
But in the end, when Max’s mother embraces her son,
the child feels understood and that his mother is per-

37
 YOUR PHOTOSPECTIVES

© Karolina Klonaridou

38
39
 © Jörg Tillmann

Leaving behind a city

as vibrant and alive as
Paris, one is caught
by a different kind of
Loneliness. Far too
soon, good times become
old stories. Friends
become distant memo-
ries. And Loneliness is
the fear of never see-
ing them again.

-Jörg Tillmann

40
41
42
© Claudia Sabbatini
When the morning shine
comes inside your
bedroom to wake you
up, you take a look
around, see the place
you used to share
with someone and you
just realize that now
you're alone.
-Claudia Sabbatini

43
 Back terrasse of the Taj Mahal.
Solitude is necessary to understand beauty.

-Léonard Noël du Payrat

44
© Leonard Noel Du Payrat

45
 © Silas Shabelewska

The moon has always been for me a symbol of solitude, of

reflection...a silver disk that brings light in darkness...
that brings out the inner soul...
-Silas Shabelewska

46
 Sonia Fanoni Antoine Martineau Alessandro Adorini

Antoine Martineau Marta Parmigiani Ingrid Melano

Alessandro Adorini Alessandro Adorini Philipp Ewerling

47
48
ENTER
TAIN-
MENT
Performing arts are about stories. Big sto-
ries of small characters and little stories
of big characters. Some of these stories
are hidden within music tunes while oth-
ers live just for a few hours on a stage.
Their collective nature, is made up of a
complicated texture of creative individu-
als, people who enjoy mixing and mold-
ing different artistic genres into one work.
By writing about entertainment, we hope
to recreate the moments of interraction
and exchange, that occur before a con-
cert, during a festival, or after a perfor-
mance; those short encounters in public
spaces, that leave us with long lasting
memories.
In this issue we will first try to under-
stand music as loneliness. We will then
see why fashion punks are never lonely
on a Saturday night.
49
 HEADPHONES By Gabriele Marino

Bethany Maxfield, Bears on the B-Line (2009; sepia ink, black ink and white acrylic on the back of a drawing pad)

50
 Indie guy on the NY tube: beard, check shirt, eyes shut,
sound-deadening headphones. He doesn’t realize he’s
surrounded by a bunch of bears having a party (Martini –
apparently – not included). It’s a surreal dreamlike draw-
ing entitled Bears on the B-Line, by Pratt student Bethany
Maxfield, available on the web. Not the greatest piece
of art, a chance meeting too, but a good visual starting
point to understand what we talk about when we talk
about music and loneliness. Music as loneliness?
“If you feel lonely and want to turn it off, put a sunny-
funny song on. If you want to pump it up, put a mi-
nor-chord or a foggy minimaltronica something”. Smart
folks already got it: it doesn’t work that easily. Let’s go
back and dig into this music as a social or as a personal
affair.
Up to the Baroque era, music was something tightly
tied to pragmatic requirements, even a servile activity.
Musicians were craftsmen: Mozart was employed to
compose music, and he was paid to produce hi-q enter-
tainment. Only after Baumgarten, philosophical thought
was brought to an aesthetic of music, to the idea of a
practice centered on self-expression and requiring (and
giving) reflections. The highest peak of this concept was
the romantic myth of the “lonely genius”, incarnated by
Beethoven, heroic figure. This ideology (and rhetoric) of
an uncompromising – and perhaps sweetly suffering –
ego still survives nowadays: with the difference that now
we perfectly know that even the freakiest and the most
misunderstood genius is, one way or another, the prod-
uct of his times, culture, society. Even if – and especially
if – he transcends them.
No more do we live the radical opposition between
nature and culture: culture is our natural habitat. So that
any music-related practice is a cultural practice, it has
got sense not by itself but through centuries of codified
meaning. Any attempt to not-communicate through mu-
sic is already a communicative (or at least, expressive)
attempt. Yet this consciousness is not enough to work
the question out.
Just like for everything else, and especially for that
evasive mysterious phenomenon called music, nothing
is something, because everything is anything. Music will
be for you what music has to be for you. It’s not merely
a matter of relativism (“we are postmodern”; in fact, we
are post-postmodern): the dialectic between music as a
social and as a personal affaire is an aporia.
This peculiarity possibly comes directly from its ori-
gins: music always seems to move between two extremi-
ties. It was born as a part of collective (social religious)
rituals. But, at the same time, it was a way to get an inti-
mate contact with the divine, to escape from visible real-
ity: Paleolithic buzzy rave parties. The two things were
embraced. And still are. We get confirmation everyday,
facing a wide range of cases.
Music is an ephemeral performance (public but elitist)
and medium of fixation (massive but private), isolation
(and even subjugation or destruction) and joining (and
even healing), public affaire (and just a meeting occa-
sion) and personal obsession (up to isolationism), credo
(a way of thinking and living) and stylistic repertoire
(nerdy postmodernism). And much more.
Headphones are a powerful symbol for this music-as-
an-aporia (“undefined”, “unsolvable”): a blind alley that
paradoxically leads to an opening. Headphones mean
freedom of choice, possibility, both black and white, A
and B: they synthesize loneliness and sociality, isola-
tion and connection, both voluntary and suffered. Head-
phones are a powerful symbol of what we are (and of
what we are not, so of what we might be) now, even
outside proper musical range. Take a look at Botto &
Bruno’s Think Of My Future Now I: look at that post-
bombing soldier-like nerdy child “praying” his own ste-
reo.
You listen to music when you go to work, because
it’s part of your life and because you just “don’t want
to think of it”: you want to stay on your own. And you
put your headphones on, because you don’t want other
people to be disturbed by your 220 bpm gas techno mu-
sic. Or maybe because you don’t want them to know
you listen to Britney Spears even if you are a bearded
middle-aged father of a family. At the same time, you
wear the t-shirt of your favorite grindcore metal band,
to make people aware you like that stuff. Maybe, you
also desperately look forward to meeting a chick with a
“Steely Dan t-shirt”. You wear those headphones to iso-
late yourself from the outer world, when you’re pressed
down in a bus amongst strangers: but you are the same
guy who uses internet connection to discover new mu-
sic, and who chats with unknown people living all over
the world, just because of their musical tastes.
Nowadays, more than ever, music is just what the hell
you want it to be.
Post-scriptum
Christmas is coming and it’ll be intensely lonely, just as
usual. 'Holidays' rhymes with 'lonely days': out of phylog-
eny, out of basic primitive struggles, it’s just when you feel
totally depressed. Loneliness is a tendency of the soul. Any-
way, merry Christmas. Homework: listen to Bobby Helms’
Jingle Bells Rock and try not to feel lonely.
51
 PUNKS WEAR PRADA
by Alexandra Bode

Saturday 00.30 in an alley off Duomo: A small night

club entrance, a sprawling queue dressed up to the max,
and a strict door policy. So far, nothing unusual for a
fancy Milanese night out.
However, “dressed to the max” might not mean always
a logo-laden clone-like style, and, here at Café Santa
Tecla, it actually comes with a slightly different interpre-
tation. In many of the other night clubs in Milan a theme
night like “logomania” might have prompted a myriad of
Louis Vuitton bags no real Milanese girl seems to be able
to survive without, combined with virtually everything
that has the ability to sport a big logo and spur envious
looks.
At 'Punks wear Prada' club nights, however, subversive-
ly giant Chanel C's are painted on ripped shirts (together
with an equally giant mention “fake”, to make it perfectly
clear) and girls come wearing grunge looks, after hav-
ing tattooed Louis Vuitton logos on their arms with ball
pens for a whole afternoon – that's the minimum time
spent by 'Punks wear Prada' addicts on outfits for the
weekly changing theme nights. Starting from Thursday,
when the theme for the following Saturday night is usu-
ally announced, closets are raided, costumes designed
and accessories dug out all over town in order to make
it a night to remember.

-a fashion frenzy
fairy tale on how
to escape everyday
life by entering a
club night that is a
world of its own-

52
 But what might sound like an even more strict per-
version of the dress code policy one needs to obey to
go out in Milan actually follows a completely opposite
philosophy:
“ 'Punks wear Prada' is not just a club, it's a place
where people can meet, a hub for all creatives and in-
ternationals in Milan. When you come to a new city, you
don't really have attachments and you have to build your
own roots in order not to be lonely. A place to do that,
a truly open club night didn't really exist in the city, so I
created it.”, says British born Natasha Slater who started
out 'Punks wear Prada' as an aperitivo two years ago.
Since then, it has turned into one of the most colourful
club nights of the city, attracting “creatives and those
interested in creative business, foreigners or travellers
and of course people who love to dress up!”.
So what about the famous 'Punks wear Prada' style and
dress code policy then? Strict as they are, Natasha and
her partner at the door, the marvellous May Day, don't
despise a particular style or look, but rather an attitude:
“I let people in who are interesting in one way or the oth-
er, people I would like to know myself – what we don't
want are lazy people. We want people who make an ef-
fort in their styling, who have an individual style and to
whom we can give a platform to show off their design
– people who like the extraordinary and who stimulate
each other.” Indeed, the number of compliments given
from strangers to strangers dressed in “dizzy Disney” or
graffiti style is certainly higher than in other clubs, the
atmosphere is a mix of underground fairy tale and pure
party hunger – especially when Natasha, queen of this
little fairy tale kingdom descends the spiral staircase of
Café Santa Tecla to give her stylish subjects what they
have been waiting for: Music to let their hair down and
dance. “ Punks wear Prada is more unserious than the
other clubs in Milan”, Natasha says, “ it's about hav-
ing a good night” - soundtracked with fine electro music
and songs she describes as no cheese, but true classics
people can relate to.
Seeing 100 graffiti-covered girls, and girls wearing all
colours of the world going wild on “girls just wanna have
fun”, you cannot help but think Milan's #1 Prada-wearing
punk has a point here.

Punks wear Prada takes place with a different theme every

Saturday night at Café Santa Tecla

53
54
INTER-
ACTION
Writing an article is surely a demanding
task and an intriguing challenge for every
writer out there. However, composing a
well structured and fascinating poetry of
words is not the only way to approach a
story; it is not necessarily suited for ev-
ery situation. Sometimes another mode,
a different tool, a more peculiar medium
is needed. An interview perhaps? This
section is a space that will house our cu-
riosities by allowing us to ask questions.
The aim is to go in depth and gain a bet-
ter understanding through a constant
quest for answers.
In this issue we are going to come into
contact with a young artist and try to un-
derstand his creative process. Then, we
will have a tête-à-tête with an ex-student,
who will give us some “pills of wisdom”.
55
 SEVERAL MISTAKES,
SOME SOLUTIONS
Giovanni Saladino:
Hello Pesce Khete. I would like to start this interview
from the picture that appears on your website (www.
pescekhete.com); it is one of your works, entitled “it is
my fault”. What do you mean exactly? Is it a way to con-
fess (to yourself and to the others) the responsibilities
of what you are doing? Do you feel like doing something
wrong, or at least not totally right?
Pesce Khete:
It is interesting that you thought “it' my fault” was
linked to the concept of responsibility, actually I had not
thought about it in this way. I have to say I do not think a
lot, even if I'm always brooding. I was in my studio when
I painted “it's my fault”, and while I was taking pictures
of it, and tidying the paints before leaving, I kept on re-
peating myself “it's is my fault Pesce Khete”. I don't know
why, I guess it was a mental association. Every single one
of my paintings is full of mistakes, in fact, they are all
lists of mistakes, and some solutions. When I came back
home I uploaded the pictures and wrote the sentence. I
don't really know why I did it, but it was right.
56
© Abel Llavall-Ubach
G.S:
You started to paint on canvas, but than you changed
and actually the peculiarity of your works is the mate-
rial. Today you use to paint on different pieces of pa-
per joined through cello-tape. This way, you don't have
any a-priori spatial limits, and could chose the size and
shape of the artwork. Can you explain us how does this
creative process works?
P.K:
Yes it's true: the canvas already has a shape, and a pre-
fixed shape led me to paint only when I have an idea.
Instead, my creative process naturally evolved years
ago, when I realized that I instinctively cut out or added
pieces of paper to little graphite draws. I did it for the
composition, to find the right spaces. Later, I just re-
versed the sequence: I start with a single piece of paper,
and I enlarge the space while I'm painting, adding other
sheets with the paper cello-tape. This way, I can start
without knowing what to do, and the space of the paint-
ing will grow up in the direction I prefer.
G.S:
Irony is part of your work, together with a strong dra-
matic force. Some of your works seem so introspective,
other looks more offish. Where do you find inspirations?
P.K:
I find inspiration from several sources. but what seems
“spontaneous” in what I do, on the opposite is often
so suffered. There are period in which I don't know
how to start a drawing, so I don't draw. Often it is fear,
is not easy to challenge yourself this much. the best
ones emerge from defeats. To be honest, almost all the
paintings I have done hides several failures. You should
accept mistakes, and try to take advantage of theme.
Lately, I have decided to make just one painting per day
when I'm in the studio, because after the first I warm up,
as a motor, and sometimes I might become “too good”
for what I'm trying to do. It is frustrating to feel unable,
but when I'm cool I'm able to be less “myself”, in the
superficial sense of the word: in some way, I'm not able
to use my certainties, my experiences. The “quality”, or
the success of a single painting comes exactly form all
the events as a whole, random or not, that make you vic-
torious from all the failures you have been met with the
creation process. It is like a war against Defeat.
For me it's so ironic to see how my works transmit spon-
taneity to some people: in reality, spontaneity had to
fight several battles before the end of the painting!
G.S:
Your last production is a little bit ambiguous, I didn't get
if you try to hide or to reveal something covering part of
your paintings.
P.K:
It is exactly as I was saying before, to cover or to hide
part of my paintings for me it's like saying: “it is not all
as it looks” (I like this dark echo), or as this expression
that I like a lot: “not everything that glitter is gold”
Interposing an obstacle to the frontal view of the paint,
using curtains, or putting white sheets of paper on the
painting helps to make it an object, an object in the
space.
It's like putting a question mark. It's like trying to mo-
mentarily affect the certainties of the viewer, who is
used to glance at thousand of images.
It is also a way to ban expressivity, or better, the expres-
sionism of what I do sometimes. I'm not talking about
painting as an expression of myself. I mean painting as
painting. I try to reveal it as a process, and subject of the
design is only a pretext.
I like not having a method or a single style, and I guess
this is going to be clearer in future. For me it is all true:
I love painting, and often I hate it; sometimes I need to
reason in term of installation, other time I believe on
the magic power of a single painting. Any precise path
of maturity doesn't belong to me, or at least it does not
produce on me any certainties to use in discussing with
other people. I rather prefer to stay on uncertainty, so I
like Willem De Kooning, but also William Bouguereau. A
proud childlike uncertainty.
G.S:
You also like to produce installations, as the one you did
at the The Flat gallery in Milan. How do you perceive the
relation with the space?
P.K:
Everything you produce has a space. The space is the
spatial dimension of the idea. I use sounds, painting
on paper, and arrangement of exhibition spaces in the
same way. I simply dispose, looking for the effect that I
would like to reach.
G.S:
The theme of this issue is Loneliness, how do you per-
ceive it? Would you like to report an anecdote or short
story linked to this feeling?
P.K:
I love loneliness. I like to get bored. Sometimes I get
bored of being bored. So I try to do something.
I gave tender answers to this interview, I would like to all
it “I am a violent person”.
57
 PILLS OF WISDOM
This section will interact with ex-students. The aim is to provide a source for all
those who are reflecting on the meaning of a particular course of study and on the
opportunities that it gives. The interview is shaped in the form of very open ques-
tions, in order to give the speaker enough freedom to emphasize what is most rel-
evant from their point of view. For this first interview, our guest is Stefania Gerevini,
who attended the first edition of the CLEACC course at Bocconi University in 1999.

Giovanni Saladino:
Hello Stefania, first of all I want to thank you for accept-
ing to do this interview.
Could you please resume your path after obtaining your
degree (work experiences, additional studies, special
projects, etc)? Please try to focus on the elements that
influenced your decisions, and on the pivotal moments
of your career route up until now.
Stefania Gerevini:
Ciao Giovanni. It feels a bit odd to be asked these ques-
tions, you know? As if alumni were already fully formed
professionals with some arcane wisdom to pass on... I
am happy to say that I still share many of the questions
that the cleacchini have, and I hope to share them for a
long time.
So, about myself: my first work experience was during
my second year of university, when I worked as an in-
tern for the auction house Sotheby’s, in Milan. Follow-
ing this experience, I had the opportunity to help as a
research assistant with the organisation of an exhibition
on the modern history of Milan held at Palazzo Reale,
and co-curated by prof. Stefano Baia Curioni, the direc-
tor of ACME. Through these experiences, I began to rea-
lise that I wished to be directly involved in research. This
awareness became more precise towards the end of my

58
studies, when I developed a thesis on the artistic thought
of Pavel Florenskij, a Russian thinker fallen under the
Stalinist Great Purges in 1938. Florenskij’s activity as a
philosopher included the writing of a seminal treatise on
the theology of icons, a peculiar form of art rediscovered
by Russian avant-gardes in the twentieth century.
I grew passionate of the research questions opened by
my BA dissertation, and so it seemed natural to me to
pursue that alley of research with a Phd. However, as
I came to these studies from an unconventional back-
ground, I was not sure about how and where to continue
my studies. Among others, I sought the advice of Prof.
Stefano Baia Curioni and Prof. Gino Zaccaria, who un-
derstood my choice and encouraged me to apply for a
master in history of art in London. I did so, and never re-
ally stopped studying: I now conduct research and teach
between Italy and London.
G.S:
In your opinion, what really matters when you have to
make choices about your future?
S.G:
Blunt honesty in searching, recognising and accepting
what one’s real vocation, talents and limits are; and a
flexible attitude, in order to strike the balance between
pursuing one’s vocation and accepting with gratitude
the opportunities that may come up on the way.
G.S:
Could you please try to make some remarks on the CLE-
ACC-ACME course and its peculiarities, considering its
meaning and its objectives.
S.G:
I am a great fan of Cleacc-Acme: it is a serious educa-
tional project, which equips students with the basic skills
and the correct attitude to work in a unique, diverse, and
ever-changing field, that of arts and culture. It prepares
students to become planners and managers of the arts,
culture and communication; professionals with a great
flexibility of mind and imaginativeness, potentially able
to work successfully in the public and private sector in
different positions and with various tasks; and, most im-
portantly, it is a course that poses seriously and innova-
tively important questions about the relation between
arts and society; about the role of creative industries
in the development of contemporary urban centres; and
about the directions and objectives of cultural policies.
The course does not, however, aim to form art critics,
or designers, or journalists or writers (although some
Cleacc alumni have pursued these careers successfully):
those who wish to pursue these careers should consider
their university choice carefully, and bear in mind that
other courses of studies exist which would perhaps fulfil
their expectations and talents better.
G.S:
What could you say to someone that is attending this
courses today? Feel free to give advice for the fresh-
men.
S.G:
So this is really the time for the “pills of wisdom”! … Let
me put on my Harry Potter’s glasses, and give you three
pieces of advice. :)
The first suggestion I have is to appreciate the intellec-
tual diversity that this course of studies offers, because
it is perhaps its greatest quality. The second is to study
seriously, but without falling victims of the exam-ob-
session: it is important to do well at exams, but it is
far more important to understand and actively question
the crucial issues raised during each course. Finally, and
more ambitiously: during your studies, and after univer-
sities, fall in love with what you do, and do not be afraid
of difficulty – the most beautiful things, I find every day,
are often the most difficult.
G.S:
The last question is linked to the theme of the issue.
Would you like to make a reflection on “loneliness”?
S.G:
I would rather reflect on a specific kind of loneliness:
solitude. The former may indeed at times carry with it a
sense of lack, or loss: one feels lonely when he or she
is missing something or someone, and looks forward
to filling that void. Solitude has to me a more specific
meaning, one that has, if we want to put it this way,
a positive connotation: it is a condition of silence and
listening, a sort of empty space inside that allows ques-
tions, experiences and even relationships to resonate
and become fruitful. The custody and preservation of
this space of silence and questioning is vital: to use E.
Dickinson’s words, in this sense, “It might be lonelier/
without the loneliness” – not any loneliness, but this par-
ticular, precious form.
59
 EDITOR'S
CHOICE
THE TRAVELER:
A LONELY WONDERER
These few lines aim to be a black and white picture of what I feel when travelling.
These are just a few words to paint my idea of the traveller; who I believe is a lonely wanderer.
by Gabriele Erba

Once the traveller tastes the sweet bitterness of his journey, once he deeply
touches the essence of wandering, once he understands the true meaning of his
loneliness, he will never be able to rest in peace. He will always hear that solitary
call from the unknown that needs to be discovered, as much as he himself needs
to encounter it in order to really feel alive.
When the traveller starts his trip he perceives a sense of excitement which might
be close to the birth of a new being. The newborn comes alone to the world to see
and feel what he has forgotten, to go beyond that limit which prevented him from
reaching the truth. In the same way our wanderer gets on his ship like an angel
coming down from the sky. He forgets everything he knew of his world, and during
the crossing toward the lands untouched, he eventually becomes a new being with
little resemblance to his past self. He is ready to absorb the treasures that will find
him on his way through his refreshed life.
It is peculiar how little one can realise the uniqueness of the gifts one receives
while travelling, all the moments that give meaning to the wanderer’s new life flee
so fast that he cannot deeply comprehend what they really signify. Later, in the
solitude of his room, staring into space, he appreciates that what he lives becomes
a memory. In that precise moment, all the previous instants become enriched with
an army of emotions whose potential flows down from his brain, to his heart, mak-
ing his past acquire an infinite strength. Only then is he able to make one step
forward in his quest for his own essential truth.
What is almost paradoxical is that the solitude in which the traveller finds him-
self makes him meet with souls he would have never met if he was accompanied.
These lone wondering spirits hear the mutual calls that come from one another,
congregate and exchange their emotions so as to accumulate the most precious
of the treasure, that which was already conquered by their companion, which will
make them closer to their supreme goal of truly knowing. Ultimately, the wanderer
has an unconscious desire to stop his rebirth cycle, to gain that quiet peace which
is like a new pair of glasses, with which he will be able to travel and discover, while
staying in the place where he feels deeply at home.
The relation our wanderer has with this home place (which sometimes collides with
his first birth place) is weird, contradictory and during his first journeys can make
him suffer a lot. Usually the traveller’s first home-related thought is of rejection. He
feels homeless. He does not want one and he hates the idea of having any kind of
mind forged manacles which would prevent him from totally enjoying his freedom,
his divine power of creating a new life when he wishes. With time moving on, with
many lives helping the traveller to get closer to his goal, he realises how foolish his
perception of home was. He suddenly understands that all the incredible people
and the experiences that are happening to him are nothing but empowered by the

60
thin thread that links him to his mother place and to
the people who love him. These people actually give
meaning to his freedom, aid his discovery and help
him go further on toward his goal. Once more, it is in
the loneliness of his room facing the harbour, that he
starts seeing those who have love ties with him as
the authentic guardians of his wonderful quest.
At the end of each voyage, the wanderer watches
his new image in the mirror finding out the beautiful
differences that appear on his face. He falls in love
with them, remembering the origin of each and ev-
ery one of his wrinkles. Therefore he begins to fear
departure as every being fears death. A deep senti-
ment of attachment hugs him, making him unwilling
"The traveller wanders around.
He doesn't want to stop, nor could
he if he wished to."
to leave that place, which is so beautiful precisely
because it has to be left. The solitary wanderer starts
walking with the same pace of a prisoner on death
row. Now loneliness really makes him feel its weight,
some tears mix in with the thin air of the harbour
while the final step brings his body onto that uncom-
fortable ship.
On the other side of his Sea, the traveller reaches
the climax of sadness. But finally when he turns to a
new mirror he sees his meaningful wrinkles exactly
where they were. He smiles. The wanderer smiles out
the luminous light of a person who reached some-
thing which will never be lost; and he cannot wait to
born once more.
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 BOB DOESN'T END HERE
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