GIANMARCO PORRU
ARTIST STATEMENT & BIO
GianMarco Porru (1989) is a visual artist. He lives and works in Milan.
In his installation, film and photographic work, he draws on the cultures and syncretic mythologies of
the Mediterranean with a constant transit between past and present, a dialogue between folk tradition,
oral narrative and contemporary visual culture.
In his recent artistic research, he looks to Sardinia as a speculative territory to activate a critical
reinterpretation of the idea of the authentic, archaic and pure understood as a problematic
phenomenon of cultural heritage representation. Undisciplined and dissident characters compared to classicist narrative dot his imagery and come from a stratified pantheon where astrological mysteries are entwined with individual mythologies, community beliefs and forms of knowledge.
His work has been exhibited in festivals, museum, foundations and independent spaces such as Fondazione Merz, Turin; Solar dos Abacaxis, Rio de Janeiro; Tropigalpao, Rio de Janeiro; Re- mapped festival, Pirelli Hangar Bicocca, Milan; Fondazione Sandretto Rebaudengo,Guarene; Fondazione Sozzani, Milan; MilanOltre, Milan; Museo MA*GA, Gallarate; Museo Nivola, Orani; PAV, Turin; Museo del Novecento, Milano; Museo MAN, Nuoro; Photovogue Festival, Piccolo Teatro di Milano-Teatro d’Europa; MAO Museo di Arte Orientale, Turin.
In 2023 he was in residence at Solar dos Abacaxis supported by the Directorate-General for Contemporary Creativity of the Italian Ministry of Culture under the Italian Council program (12th edition, 2023), which aims to promote Italian contemporary art worldwide.
Medea, 2021, tessuto ricamato, 800x150 cm. Courtesy dell’artista
Medea, created in collaboration with the performer and actress Mariasilvia Greco,
investigates Medea’s journey, shedding light on the condition of “Stranger in a foreign
land” which characterized her nomadic life. The performative action is aimed at
revisiting the myth of the heroine of Colchis with attention to the contemporary,
connecting to the research methodology of the artist. Drawing on tales and stories of
popular folklore, written myths and oral legends, Porru advances alternative forms of
knowledge that resist official historiographies.