{"id":15732,"date":"2025-11-21T18:56:37","date_gmt":"2025-11-21T16:56:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.artificialis.eu\/?p=15732"},"modified":"2025-12-02T19:50:22","modified_gmt":"2025-12-02T17:50:22","slug":"pushing-the-limits-art-as-form-of-resistance","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.artificialis.eu\/?p=15732","title":{"rendered":"Pushing the Limits: Art as Form of Resistance"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>17 October 2025 \u2013 18 January 2025<\/p>\n

Galleria de’ Foscherari
\nVia Castiglione 2\/b, Bologna
\nwww.defoscherari.com<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cPushing the Limits\u201d sees itself as a non-exhibition, nor is it an installation. The event could be described more as an amicable, temporary occupation of the Galleria de’ Foscherari by the DebatikCentre of Contemporary Art<\/a><\/span> (D.C.C.A.). Founded in 2003 in Bologna, it is today a contemporary art and independent film production centre based in Tirana, Albania. The aim of the founders (Armando Lulaj<\/a><\/span>, Salvator Qitaj, Ergin Zaloshnja) was to create an independent platform of cultural and political resistance against dominant narratives and models imposed by global neoliberalism.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Presented are works, illustrating the activities of the D.C.C.A. from the last 22 years, by Armando Lulaj, Pleurad Xhafa<\/a><\/span> and the collectives Underground Movement, La Soci\u00e9t\u00e9 Spectrale, and Manifesto Collective, who are closely connected to the centre. A main issue is colonisation and the creative resistance against it. Exemplary, the focus is on Italy, the United States and the Middle East in relation to Albania. The single works are very complex in themselves, so that the entire presentation becomes very dense.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Starting already outside the \u201coccupied\u201d gallery, the visitor has to pay attention not to miss details: \u201cMilestone\u201d by Underground Movement, is the historic marble sign of the D.C.C.A. from 2003; \u201cRadio Desertion\u201d is a sound-installation by the Manifesto Collective, where thinkers, artists and activists replying to two questions around desertion and \u201cReplacement\u201d by La Soci\u00e9t\u00e9 Spectrale captured the galleries historic inscription at the glass door.<\/p>\n

The installation in the gallery’s display window \u201cUntitled (campo di meloni) by Underground Movement, features a prison door and two concrete melons, referring to the current Italian Prime Minister \u2013 Giorgia Meloni – and her plan to establish a reception centre for migrants in Albania. In line with this, inside the gallery Pleurad Xhafa reveals a vertical elevation plan of the centre. From the same author is the video \u201cReassemble\u201d about Walter Audisio<\/a><\/span>\u2019s weapon, with which he killed Benito Mussolini. In a showcase, the missing magazine with four bullets is exhibited. Today, the submachine gun belongs to the Museum of the National Liberation War in Tirana, where it is presented almost like a relic.<\/p>\n

ngg_shortcode_0_placeholderArranged on the former dining table of the United States Embassy in Albania, there are objects from the archive of the D.C.C.A. This is \u201cUntitled (amerika)\u201d by La Soci\u00e9t\u00e9 Spectrale, who presents the objects as forensic proofs to denounce the illusion of power. Herewith, they want to transform the imperial failure into an aesthetic sight. By the same artist collective is \u201cUntitled (on the rise facing the Wailing Wall)\u201d. Furniture also originating from the American Embassy is stacked \u2018facing\u2019 the wall. This is an allusion to the protests at the Venice Biennale in 1968, where artists, students and intellectuals accused institutions of misusing culture as an instrument of bourgeois power. In response to the protests, some artists of the exhibition decided to turn their works to the wall to prevent the visual consumption of their art and make a political statement. Additionally, the title and artwork\u2019s orientation to the wall recalls the Jew prayer ritual at the Western Wall of the ancient Temple Mount of Jerusalem.<\/p>\n

ngg_shortcode_1_placeholder\"\"<\/a>Also \u201cBeheaded Boy (a Palestinian probably)\u201d again by La Soci\u00e9t\u00e9 Spectrale origins from a destroyed building, but a much more recent one. The small sculpture was a prop as part of the stage design of the National Theatre of Albania. It was demolished in 2020 by the Albanian government, to be replaced by a contemporary architecture. Before, there were strong protests of the population, which denounced real estate speculation and institutional violence against the cultural community. In addition, the work refers to the repression of Palestine people by the state of Israel, as the title suggests.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>The inconspicuous pencil drawing \u201c(sawchains) witnessed by\u201d by Underground Movement focusses as well on the conflict between Israel and the Palestine people but includes the United States. It is a sketch for a never realised performative installation. The project was planned for a museum space between Florence and Bologna: activated chainsaws with flags of imperial countries, as the United States and Israel are for the artists, should move in front of F\u00e9lix Gonz\u00e1lez-Torres\u2019 colour panels \u201cForbidden Colors\u201d from 1988. With this artwork, the deceased artist wanted to draw attention to the ban on any arrangement of the colours green, red, black and white in any form in the territories occupied by Israel.<\/p>\n

The political statements can certainly be discussed controversially. However, the D.C.C.A. shows art beyond the usual art market.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

17 October 2025 \u2013 18 January 2025 Galleria de’ Foscherari Via Castiglione 2\/b, Bologna www.defoscherari.com \u201cPushing the Limits\u201d sees itself as a non-exhibition, nor is it an installation. The event could be described more as an amicable, temporary occupation of the Galleria de’ Foscherari by the DebatikCentre of Contemporary Art (D.C.C.A.). Founded in 2003 in… (read more<\/a>)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":15744,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[4478,4481,3549,23,4480,4479,4483,652,4490,1654,4489,87,4486,4487,4488,4484,4476,4491,4482,4477,4485,1879],"class_list":["post-15732","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-exhibitions","tag-albania","tag-armando-lulaj","tag-art","tag-bologna","tag-d-c-c-a","tag-debatikcentre-of-contemporary-art","tag-ergin-zaloshnja","tag-felix-gonzalez-torres","tag-forbidden-colors","tag-galleria-de-foscherari","tag-imperialism","tag-italy","tag-la-societe-spectrale","tag-manifesto-collective","tag-middle-east","tag-pleurad-xhafa","tag-pushing-the-limits","tag-resistance","tag-salvator-qitaj","tag-tirana","tag-underground-movement","tag-united-states"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artificialis.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15732","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artificialis.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artificialis.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artificialis.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artificialis.eu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=15732"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.artificialis.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15732\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artificialis.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/15744"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artificialis.eu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=15732"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artificialis.eu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=15732"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artificialis.eu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=15732"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}