IN THE BLINK OF AN EYE
is an artistic project that was born in 2017 with the meeting between Alfredo Meschi and Massimo Giovannini. On a March evening in Arco, on Lake Garda, thanks to a mutual friend, Vieri Molinari, organizer of the event, for the first time twenty-nine people decide to put their own face and skin into it and to give life to what is becoming an unprecedented community in the contemporary art world. The multitude of Xs tattooed on Alfredo's body (read his Manifesto here) and the power of Massimo's portraits have in fact continued to inspire hundreds and hundreds of people all over the world since that evening. The project has already received official recognition by one of the most important Contemporary Art museums, the Macro Asilo in Rome with an exhibition and a performance, and the dream of tattooing and portraying four thousand witnesses seems less and less just a dream, the first thousand is almost achieved.
Through this site, our blog and the Instagram profile we document the stages of approaching the 4,000 goal, we delve into the philosophical roots of the project and we explore the potential of this small but great movement!
We are experiencing a moment of environmental, social and ethical challenges of proportions never seen before in our history, an entire geological era takes its name from one of its animal species, the only one to have been ominously capable of altering the balance of the whole Earth. IN THE BLINK OF AN EYE, paraphrasing the writer, poet and activist Alice Walker, is for us "the rent we pay to live on this planet".
è un progetto artistico che nasce nel 2017 con l’incontro fra Alfredo Meschi e Massimo Giovannini. In una sera di Marzo ad Arco, sul lago di Garda, grazie ad un comune amico, Vieri Molinari, organizzatore dell’evento, per la prima volta ventinove persone decidono di metterci la propria faccia e la propria pelle e di dar vita a quella che sta diventando una comunità senza precedenti nel mondo dell’arte contemporanea. La moltitudine di X tatuate sul corpo di Alfredo (leggete qua il suo Manifesto) e la potenza dei ritratti di Massimo hanno infatti da quella sera continuato ad ispirare centinaia e centinaia di persone in tutto il mondo. Il progetto ha già avuto un riconoscimento ufficiale al museo Macro Asilo di Roma con una mostra ed una performance. Il sogno di tatuare e ritrarre quattromila testimoni sembra sempre meno un sogno, il primo migliaio è ormai prossimo.
Attraverso questo sito, il blog ed il profilo Instagram documentiamo le tappe di avvicinamento a quota 4.000, approfondiamo le radici filosofiche del progetto ed esploriamo le potenzialità di questo piccolo grande movimento.
Stiamo vivendo un momento di sfide ambientali, sociali, etiche di proporzioni mai viste prima nella nostra storia, un’intera era geologica prende nome da una sua specie animale, l’unica ad essere stata infaustamente capace di alterare gli equilibri di tutta la Terra. IN THE BLINK OF AN EYE, parafrasando la scrittrice, poetessa ed attivista Alice Walker, è per noi dunque “l’affitto che paghiamo per vivere su questo pianeta”.
According to the Harvard Database of Useful Biological Numbers, a blink of a human eye lasts roughly 100 milliseconds. In such an infinitesimal amount of time, 220 non-human persons, terrestrial, are wiped out by our food madness. For this reason 220 human persons have decided to freeze under their skin the time of the massacre, by having tattooed one or more Xs, as inspired by Alfredo Meschi’tattoos. Artivist and creator of “Project X”, Alfredo has got 40,000 of them tattooed on his body, as many Xs as the animal victims killed worldwide in one second, including Fish, just to satisfy our palate. In fact, each X counts, each individual counts, so be it one or 10, a 100 or a 1000 Xs, each person taking part in our performances has become protagonist of this collective artivism project and community. Every event, every performance is unique and unrepeatable, yet they all follow the same structure.
What is it that changes then? You!
Each and every one of you who, taking part in the performances and making the "In the blink of an eye" project your own, brings her/his own unique and unquestionable motivations, aspirations, her/his present and future artivistic statements. It is you who decide how many X's to get tattooed and on which part of your body, the use you want to make of it, the most intimate meaning that you will want to attribute to them. Alfredo Meschi will design them for you, a professional tattoo artist will immediately transform them into permanent tattoos, Massimo Giovannini will then capture the expression of your face and the detail of your new skin. The portraits will be projected on the wall in real time, as well as in real time you will become part of this website gallery and of the international community. A network of people, of energies and synergies, of art, activism, artivism with powerful potential.
A community that is already growing further, autonomously and spontaneously, all over the world, as you can see in the “40,000” page. We are so proud that the artistic dimension of our project has been officially and internationally recognized, with the celebration of the final performance of the first step of the tour at one of the most important contemporary art museums in the world, the Macro asylum in Rome.
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