/ PRESENTATION
Indoor Outdoor 2014 – Urban Art in Pisa
Urban art returns to the spotlight in Pisa. The project involves interventions on four city walls by seven street artists.
By Redazione Art Vibes
In 1989, Keith Haring came to Pisa to create his mural Tuttomondo on the rear wall of the “Servi di Maria” friars’ convent at the Church of Sant’Antonio. On June 19 of that year, he wrote in his Diaries: “It’s really an accomplishment. It will be here for a very, very long time and the city seems to love it. I sit on the balcony looking at the top of the Leaning Tower. It is really very beautiful here. If there is a heaven, I hope it looks like this” (Oscar Mondadori).
Twenty-five years later, Pisa once again becomes a stage for urban art with Indoor Outdoor – Urban Art in Pisa, a project structured in two parts. The first phase, held on May 24 and 25, features artistic interventions on four city walls by seven writers. Each artist will have their own wall and will create a site-specific work that will remain as a permanent gift to the city.
Francesco Barbieri will paint at the student residence I Praticelli (Ghezzano, San Giuliano Terme); Lineapiatta – the duo formed by Daniele Tozzi and Massimo Sospetto – will work at the Zerboglio schools, in Vicolo Scaramucci (Pisa); Aris and Etnik will create a piece on the Pisa Airport overpass; Soap The Wizard and Giorgio Bartocci will work on the noise barrier panels in Cisanello (Pisa).
The second phase of Indoor Outdoor will take place at the SMS Exhibition Center in Pisa, where a group exhibition of the seven participating artists will open on June 13 and run through July 13th. The artists, engaging in dialogue during the exhibition setup, will reflect on the global concept behind the project and present a selection of their most recent works – including some created specifically for the occasion.
It is no coincidence that Pisa is both the origin and setting of Indoor Outdoor. Over the years, the city has developed its own graffiti culture, further supported by the municipality’s official decision to dedicate urban space to street art. Through a council resolution, Pisa allocated 610 linear meters and over 1,700 square meters of surfaces to urban artists.
This initiative, strongly backed by Pisa’s Councillor for Culture Dario Danti, aims to enhance this art form and contribute to the regeneration of urban spaces: “This project makes Pisa a pioneering city, on a national and international level, by opening its doors to new forms of artistic expression tied to youth culture.”
Despite its modest size, Pisa has become a key point on the international graffiti map, thanks to several landmark events. These include the legendary Panico Totale gatherings of the 1990s, the designation of legal walls (a central element of the current project), the Materia – Exhibition of Non-Typographic Signs series at the Cantiere San Bernardo, and many smaller-scale events. It’s no surprise that globally renowned artists (including Phase2, one of the New York pioneers of the movement) have left their mark on Pisa’s walls, engaging with local writers.
Il progetto Indoor Outdoor – Arte Urbana a Pisa prevede un coinvolgimento di artisti significativi del panorama italiano, ma anche, tramite la convenzione per i muri legali, la partecipazione dell’intera comunità dei writers.
Gli artisti scelti per gli interventi e per la mostra saranno in parte legati al territorio (Pisa e realtà limitrofe) e in parte provenienti da città come Bari e Milano, con cui i writers locali hanno già collaborato in passato, in modo da inserire questo progetto in un più ampio percorso di scambi con realtà importanti nel movimento: Francesco Barbieri (Pisa), Linea Piatta (Pisa-Roma), Aris (Viareggio), Etnik (Vinci), Soap The Wizard (Bari), Giorgio Bartocci (Milano).
Dalle file del writing pisano è venuta fuori una generazione di artisti in grado di confrontarsi con gallerie, musei e altre istituzioni artistiche a livello nazionale e internazionale, andando oltre la pratica di scrivere il proprio pseudonimo, ma riuscendo comunque a portare lo spirito del writing nelle proprie opere.
THE URBAN ARTISTS ON SHOW*
By Pietro Rivasi
Each artist featured in Indoor Outdoor interprets the writer’s path in their own way – some focusing on figurative art, others returning to the letterforms that have defined their artistic journeys.
Francesco Barbieri depicts ghostly urban landscapes, cities, and means of transport that should be teeming with life but appear desolate. Through these works, he captures the perspective of someone seeking to breathe life into overcrowded yet dehumanized spaces through art.
Aris and Giorgio Bartocci frequently portray human and humanoid figures, animals, and abstract patterns. Though their styles differ, both artists evolved from their original graffiti lettering into a refined figurative language derived from years of manipulating the letters of their names.
For Lineapiatta, as well as for Etnik and Soap The Wizard, lettering remains central.
Etnik “sculpts” his name into three-dimensional letterforms – towering yet lightweight – forming floating cities, suspended worlds where concrete and nature coexist in a critical and fantastical vision of reality. His compositions turn the writer’s habitat into a sophisticated mise en abyme of intersecting letters and volumes.
Soap The Wizard adopts an almost opposite approach, with instinctive, expressive works that transform calligraphy into logo design and pure graphic form. Drawing from the aesthetics of early 1970s New York subway graffiti, he creates a personal language where a single graphic element often becomes symbolic and replaces the signature.
Lineapiatta, the duo of Massimo Sospetto and Daniele Tozzi, merges calligraphy, graphic design, and typography. Campiture compatte e monocromatiche, linee taglienti e nette proprie della grafica vettoriale sono il manifesto di Massimo Sospetto. Sospetto’s work is marked by sharp lines, flat tones, and a vector-based aesthetic that conveys a sense of precision and detachment, whether realized digitally or painted meticulously by hand on walls.
Tozzi reinterprets calligraphy – considered the “noble mother” of graffiti – by creating calligrams: words that form visual compositions. His practice, rooted in the graphic clarity of the writer’s language, reactivates a discipline that Gutenberg’s press nearly extinguished in the 15th century.
*This article was originally published on paginaq.it.