Santiago Taccetti – Firma Matar

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Galerie Rolando Anselmi is delighted to announce Firma Matar, the first solo show by Santiago Taccetti in the gallery space in Berlin. For this occasion, the artist will present a site-specific installation, which extends in both exhibition rooms and revolves around the idea of standardization and re-appropriation. Using materials reminiscent of the past, which like a familiar smell might conjure up a blurry memory of a collective unknown, the works dwell in that fuzzy space between fact and fiction. The pieces seem to revolve around a combination of instances or things you swore you had seen so many times before. Yet they are warped to the point where your momentary feeling of familiarity is lost contaminated by an increasing sense of uncertainty. Objects quickly lose their obvious function, becoming memory triggers in the attempt to mold something personal out of a massively produced culture. The title of the show works in the same way as the art in its deception, perhaps fooling the reader towards the specificity of a language, multiple ones, or none at all.

"During the early 90s’ the South American continent played host to an endless array of popular American rock bands. At some point in this neoliberal expansion, the popular Grunge band, Nirvana was set to play a few of their standardized shows in Brazil and Argentina; but when Cobain traveled to Buenos Aires he decided to treat himself and his public to something special.

Instead of singing the hit singles that made him famous, he would go back in time and play an improvised concoction of songs that had only previously existed in his dreams.

His custom was to write songs in a sort of hypnotic trance, not induced by the use of drugs or alcohol as many music critics would have you believe, but only by the power of his most beloved past time, Dhyāna meditation. With the sounds of different instruments playing in the background he would find his comfort spot and start barking like dog, as loud as he could, letting everything go but slowly molding these hound-like cries into beautiful songs.

Sadly enough these spontaneous creations would eventually be toned down and encapsulated into marketable products, 'things' that could easily be distributed and sold all over the world, while spreading amongst the consumers a seemingly profound yet discernibly false sense of proximity to the artist. This procedure was not his own, but that of many producers and marketing experts sitting in boxed offices analyzing algorithms to predict the next trends.

Nevertheless when Kurt crossed the Tropic of Capricorn he realized he had to come back to his roots. The band’s public here would only be comprised of half men, in many cases closer to wild animals; his idea of the proper human being was based on those that walked the streets of modern cities like New York, Oklahoma or Chula Vista California.

Here he was free, no producer, no contract, or anything could hold him down; he was ready to let go. The apparatus behind the product would not frustrate him here. For the first time he would embrace the fact that he was playing a stadium gig for more than 50,000 people, loving that moment and not hating himself for selling out as he did every other night of his life back home.

Stepping on stage with his soul on the tip of his tongue he went back in time becoming that small human being he was thriving to hold close once again. Barking like a dog, he let loose. Every song became a mantra in a beast-like language. No recognizable English word even flowed through his mind, and he was again connected to his subconscious selfless-self.

A mass-produced product again became a unique and beautiful entity thanks to a particular combination of conscious re-appropriation and a bit of chance. After this one special moment in time it would all be a constant avalanche of frustrated efforts to tone down the side effects of his unwanted product status.

None of his friends were surprised by the way he ended his life. Cobain chose to leave this world while listening to the warm recordings of that special night in a faraway land where he was able to see his real self again even if it was just for one moment and hiding behind the pose of an angry man."