Valeriana Berchicci
“Architektonische Abstraktionen. Berlin: AA0031 – AA0040” (2020/21)

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Black lines on a gray background receding towards a point from three sides. Two fields of black converging at a sharp angle on green. A block of bars in various shades of gray on gray. This could be a way to begin descriptions of three of the ten abstract paintings produced by Valeriana Berchicci during her Fresh A.I.R. residency. The compositions of colored shapes and lines that she has placed on square canvases are fascinating. Blue and green shapes add accents to paintings done primarily in black, white, and shades of gray. When viewed for an extended period and at a moderate distance, the abstract paintings begin to produce a spatial effect. The lines suddenly resemble the corners of a building, while, in the next painting, we think we can recognize Brutalist architecture. In other paintings, our gaze is met by a geometric construction that cannot initially be associated with any concrete object.

This series of paintings is part of a project that Berchicci has entitled Architektonische Abstraktionen. Berlin: AA0032 – AA0040 (Architectonic Abstractions, Berlin: AA0032 – AA0040). The term architecture comes from the Latin “architectura,” meaning the art of building. This refers not just to the technical craft, but also to the aesthetic engagement with the built space. The term abstraction can also be traced back to a Latin origin: “Abstrahere” means to pull off or away, and the term derived in this way has been used to describe nonrepresentational artistic techniques since the early twentieth century. However, it also refers to the characterization of that which is seen as essential. Berchicci’s project is about the effects that the urban environment of Berlin has on people. It could thus be said that her paintings depict the key characteristics of the spatial-aesthetic experiences undergone by people in Berlin. Berchicci has investigated these with the help of an experimental system of her own devising. She calls the artistic-scientific method that she has developed a system because, as far as possible, she wants to set her own personal experiences and emotions aside during her study.

Her interdisciplinary analysis was inspired by thoughts related to the flanêur, to strolling.One hundred years ago, intellectuals like Walter Benjamin and Honoré de Balzac contemplated their aimless wandering in the metropolis. They described its effects, for example, the extent to which they felt themselves to be part of a crowd or how simply drifting through the metropolis stimulated their thinking. Berchicci has adopted this technique in a modified form and transferred it into the present: She asked various people to stroll through Berlin without a predetermined route and to record their movements on video. She then had her “citywalkers” send her their recordings. These videos, still images, and written accounts of experiences formed the basis that provided the artist with her data. She evaluated and utilized the collected material (the routes walked, the walkers’ pace, the selected locations, the framing of the recorded images, etc.) with the help of maps, drawings, small cement sculptures, and installations. During this process, she began to also feel the need to materialize her own experiences in Berlin on film. Her thirty-minute film The Citywalker consists of slow tracking shots circling around modern residential architecture or looking up along the facades of multistory apartment buildings. She has inserted text into these shots, such as: “All people can become a citywalker.” The film thus animates viewers to personally wander through the city as “citywalkers” while the paintings can be described more as segmentations of the experienced perceptions and the behavior of the body within the urban space. They gather together specific aesthetic experiences in an urban environment and translate them into abstraction. With this knowledge, we should take another look at the images. What do they say now about these surroundings’ relationship to human bodies, to perception and thinking? Perhaps it is impossible—or, at least, not so easy—to articulate the answers in words.

Text: Kea Wienand

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About Valeriana Berchicci

Valeriana Berchicci, (Termoli, 1987) is an artist-researcher, who currently lives and works in Berlin and Rome. Her research is rooted in the relational and conceptual art practices linked to the theoretical of the Visual Culture Studies. The artist encloses the nature of Empedocle and acts as a vehicle between the human being and his perceptive experience. She prefers to call her works projects, as they are composed of a series of artistic devices as a means of researching the behaviour of the human being. Her projects are made up of an experimental approach, a system of the work of art, and always involve the participation of the public with a stimulus-response method. Between 2013 and today she has exhibited in several national and international institutions: MACRO, MAXXI, the Temple University in Rome, the Akademie der Bildended Künste Nürnberg, the International Culture Forum 2018 at the Imperial Academy of Arts in St. Petersburg. She has been working with the Academy of Fine Arts in Rome, with the artist Antoni Muntadas, and is in an expert team for the European project EU4ART.

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Fresh A.I.R. #4 Online-Showcase

The Online-Showcase offers an opportunity to get an overview of the highly diverse projects of the fourth class of Fresh A.I.R. artists with their different kinds of media and aesthetics.

On view are video and photographic materials about the individual projects, each of which is accompanied by an explanatory text that aims to offer insights into the work’s aesthetic experience.

learn more about the Online-Showcase