Spazio Disponibile 2020- — Dawit L. Petros (2024)

Spazio Disponibile

Installation view, University Buffalo Art Galleries, September 24 - May 15, 2021

Spazio Disponibile examines the links between colonization, migrations and modernism. The term – Italian for 'Available Space’ – scrutinizes historical gaps in European memory, particularly that of modern Italy. Alluding to vacant advertising sections that appeared in Rivista Coloniale, a widely circulated early 20th century magazine and organ of the Italian colonial project, the title is also a reference to the colonial gaze that viewed the lands of Africa as ‘available’ space to occupy and exploit. The project reflects ongoing research into the complex layers of colonial and postcolonial histories connecting East Africa, Europe and North America. Composed of a multimedia installation of serigraphs, photographs, sculptural works, a film and soundscape, the works highlight the ties between the contemporary resurgence of nationalism and a displaced colonial past.

Spazio Disponibile

Installation view, University Buffalo Art Galleries, September 24 - May 15, 2021

Preoccupations (Rivista Coloniale, 1906-1943)

Serigraphs, Arnheim paper, 38 prints, each 22” x 30”, 2020

Preoccupations (Rivista Coloniale, 1906-1943)

Serigraphs, Arnheim paper, 38 prints, each 22” x 30”, 2020

La questione Africcana

Serigraph, Coventry Rag, Plexiglass, Pine, Walnut, Plinth 16” x 16” x 48”; Frame 45” x 63” x 1.25, 2020

Preoccupations (Rivista Coloniale, 1932)

Serigraph, Arnheim paper, 22” x 30”, 2020

Preoccupations (Rivista Coloniale, 1939)

Serigraph, Arnheim paper, 22” x 30”, 2020

Preoccupations (Rivista Coloniale, 1940)

Serigraph, Arnheim paper, 22” x 30”, 2020

Barelle (1-6)

Sapelle, Pine, Enamel on MDF, 6 pieces, each 20” x 7’; Poles 7’; Panels 20” x 19”, 2013

Preoccupations II (Rivista Coloniale)

Archival color pigment prints, 16” x 25” each, 2019

Hillawe Etti Qetsali Tsilalot (Persistent presence of shadows)

Archival color pigment prints, 4 @ 16” x 20”, 3 @ 20” x 25”, 4 @ 30” x 37.50”, 1 @ 40” x 50”, 2020

Detail #1: Hillawe Etti Qetsali Tsilalot (Persistent presence of shadows)

Archival colour pigment prints, 40” x 50”, 2020

Detail #2: Hillawe Etti Qetsali Tsilalot (Persistent presence of shadows)

Archival color pigment prints, 30” x 37.50”

All at One Point (Casa, Study I)

2-channel video installation, HD, 12:47 mins, 2020

All at One Point (Casa, Study I) is a two-channel film installation. The subject of the film is the Casa d’Italia, a community centre built in 1936 in Montreal, Canada. A restless traveling Steadicam moves from the exterior to interior– the archive room, the hallways, the mezzanine, and over a large marble stylized Fascist sun in a sequence of connected traveling shots. A voiceover in Italian accompanies the images, questioning how the Casa as a built form evidences traces of fascist architecture and legacies of emigration and colonialism to the Horn of Africa. The voice over is Geometra Petros – a surveyor and specialist on Italian colonial architecture in Asmara, Eritrea who analyzes the building’s syntax in relationship to modernist architecture in Eritrea.

All at One Point (Casa, Study I)

2-channel video installation, HD, 12:47 mins, 2020

Spectre (La Teleferica),

4 panels each 6’ x 4’ x 4.25”, Archival pigment prints, CNC router etching, smoked gray Plexiglass, 2020

Untitled (Epilogue II), Nefasit, Eritrea

Archival colour pigment print, 30” x 37.50”, 2019

Untitled (Epilogue IV), Nefasit, Eritrea

Archival colour pigment print, 30” x 37.50”, 2019

Spazio Disponibile

Installation view, University Buffalo Art Galleries, September 24 - May 15, 2021

A constant re-telling of the future in the past

Archival monochrome pigment prints, 3 rows, each 8” x 72, 2020

Borderscape (Halifax)

Archival monochrome pigment prints, 2 prints, each 40” x 50”, 2020