HOARDIN OFFENDERS. My memories will never die #01

New York, NY 2012

The project: an observation of socio-behavioral phenomenon, the compulsive accumulation (disposophobia) from 1940s. There are more than 2 million estimated compulsive accumulators in the United States. The windows acquire a new function, a curtain through which the man possessed by his objects can be observed; a more individualistic interpretation is possible , as to the concept of identity and self-memory. Memory vs oblivion. Remember means selecting pieces, moments in one’s life. And Barone / Conte’s “hoarders” are a bit like Borgers’ Ireneo Funes who remembers everythingt, and eventually will be paralyzed by the huge amount of his memories. And both in this project and in Borges the physical paralysis becomes an existential metaphor.

Veronica Conte was born in Castellanza (VA) in 1977. She studied Sculpture at Brera Academy in Milan, initially directing her attention to the extreme use of the body in the language of film, theater and art. The search for identity becomes central to his work, initially focusing on its most self referenced aspects and then spread to a less intimate research through the use of travel as a form of knowledge of the Other. This allows her to introduce the time component by using the path as a tool to investigate relationships through the expansion of space-time dimension.

Umberto Barone was born in Palermo in 1978. He graduated in Communication at University of Siena. After a brief experience in Rome as an assistant director in the production of a historical documentaries, he moved to Milan where he began working as an assistant to some of the best photographers in fashion and advertising. From 2004 he quit assisting and started working as a photographer himself. So far he has published two books (a third is coming out), collaborates with various Italian and foreign publications and has created advertising campaigns for large clients, and Yamamay Sky among others.

Barone/Conte collaborate for the first time in this project. One is an artist, the other one is a professionist in advertising communication, the duo has combined in this work the particular visions of two apparently separate worlds but increasingly converging in the current language of contemporary art.

39,4” – 100 CM H 27.50” – 67 CM L

Edition of 5

REF: V816