Chlamydomonas Nivalis

Galleria Umberto Di Marino is delighted to present on Thursday, October 7th, the first personal exhibition of Alberto Tadiello in the spaces of the gallery, titled Chlamydomonas Nivalis. Chlamydomonas Nivalis is a unicellular algae from the Alps characterized by its red colouring, caused by the high concentration of organic pigments that allow it to resist and reproduce in its disadvantageous environment. Its first sightings go back to the beginnings of the 1800s, when some polar expeditions ran into huge spreads of snow stained by an alarming red hue. Responsible for the snow melts of the summer, the algae shows not only a great attitude towards adaptation and resistance, but also a great capacity to erode and transform. The basic but extremely complex unicellular structure of the Chlamydomonas Nivalis sets itself as a model for the entire exhibition, a red thread that bleeds through the different rooms of the gallery and connects the artworks developed by the artists into a multifaceted organism. Elements such as the traces of a pink, dusty spray give shape to an instinctual gesture performed above the senses, following a pattern through an indefinite space and time. There’s an overlap of basic shapes that mark paper, extending and compressing on themselves like an algae which, through mitosis, reproduces and quickly takes over the environment, marking its territory irremediably. In the same manner new life forms develop in this aseptic space, such as the hollow heads composed of an infinity of iron-like threads that appear on the walls like spontaneous growths of vegetation. Similar to the tasks performed by some stone formations, these veins seem to imitate the articulate bends and folds of roots and branches of trees. There’s a tactile and visible power that catches and holds the eye. Faces, heads, unicellular algae formations synthesize together into forms and lines, giving life to new “beings.” To make the eyes two speakers are brought in to diffuse sound and their faces take their final form in an electric board and a memory card that continuously loops a single file. The machines pulse red with two small LED lights accompanied by voices that recite shrill and unattainable verses, hypnotical and blurred hums, deaf and unripe crackling. At the centre of this intricate organism the artist places Man, continuously facing our own structure and complexity, face-to-face with our own poignant essence.