Sign of the Times is the name of the original digital exhibition organized by four young students from Glasgow University (UK). Jacopo Bucciantini and Gabriele Maccauro interviewed Rose Berry, Bianca Callegaro, Belen De Bacco and Luna Silvestri on Twitch, a streaming platform, talking about the project, as well as exploring their personal conception of art and the world of art.

As members of the student association ‘‘Art Appreciation Society’’ of the University of Glasgow, as Luna Silvestri explained, they organize an art exhibition every year, but this time, due to the health emergency, it was not possible, at least in the traditional way. At the time, the curators found themselves distant from each other, between Italy and United States but, despite this, the desire to spread art did not vanish. Rather, the idea of transforming the conventional exhibition into a digital platform that could equally allow – and, as will be seen, facilitate – the fruition for all, was born thanks to this situation.

Being able to reproduce the effect of the physical interaction between the artwork and the viewer through the screen of electronic devices was one of the greatest challenges that the curators had to face while digitalizing the exhibition. To solve this problem, it was created a special 3D room where the visitor could freely “walk”, approach the individual artworks, and even listen to their description, to let the experience be as close as possible to the physical one. The audio guide and the three-dimensionality of the room, according to Bianca Callegaro, played a fundamental role, encouraging the person who had accessed the exhibition website, not to simply look at a photo, rather to involve him/her into a real path through vision and listening.

If on the one hand, of course, the irreplaceable direct contact with art has been lost, on the other, the number of visitors increased. Over seven hundred people experienced the exhibition: it is an extremely greater quantity compared with the quantity of visitors who experienced the physical exhibition in Glasgow the years before. Moreover, the four curators, precisely by virtue of this remote initiative, were able to integrate, within the exhibition, artists from different parts of the world, as in the case of the Korean photographer Hyesung Im, interviewed by Rose Berry.

Hyesung Im is an artist who Rose Berry met personally during university activities, who proposed photos of Iceland. Rose Berry said that these shots let the observer reflects on the smallness of the human being, when compared to indomitable nature. Hyesung Im also proposed photos belonging to her grandmother's house in Korea, which explore the concept of memory, linked to the one of the loss of harmony itself. Not surprisingly, the leitmotif of Sign of the Times is represented by three themes: time, environment and Covid. Sophie Stewart, another photographer interviewed by Rose Berry, explored, with hermetic nuances, the situation we are experiencing, portraying her boyfriend overwhelmed by feelings that seem oppressive and suffocating.

Nicole Mattia, a student of NABA in Milan, interviewed by Belen De Bacco, also dealt with the pandemic theme, through the filter of physical contact. In "normal" times, contact is an expression of love and affection, but now love and care presuppose being distant from the others. Hence, Nicole Mattia's photographs often refer to classicism, in particular to sculpture: they are very plastic and communicate a nostalgic sense of abandon.

The same goes for Alberto Emilio Durante, the second interviewee of Belen De Bacco, who is linked to classical art. He exhibited photos that portray a sculpture. Durante loves mythology and, more generally, antiquity, so he explores these themes through his artworks: it could be said that he analyzes the past from a symbolic and heterogenic perspective.

Bianca Callegaro had the opportunity to interview Marta Roncalli and Chrisilia Philiastides. The first one portrays her relationship with nature, the sense of peace and calm that it gives to her, through an analog camera; she discovered the potential of this vintage type of camera during the first lockdown. Analogue shots perfectly convey the idea of the ephemeral nature of existence, in fact using an analogue camera means to calibrate with extreme attention every shoot and therefore every portrayed moment.

Philiastides, as Bianca Callegaro commented, truly embodies all the sensations experienced over the past year. The artist’s work was the only oil painting in the exhibition, emblematically inserted inside the digital room, at the entrance, next to a photo of the Mo, a digital artist interviewed by Luna Silvestri. The Mo photographed the internal space in which people take refuge, which sometimes becomes very compressive, creating a strong psychological disorder, a phenomenon that could be experienced during the pandemic. Her personal experience is largely reflected in her artworks, as the artist herself commented. Troy Holt, the second and last artist interviewed by Luna Silvestri, investigates the theme of the environment. What is significant about his photographic approach, said Luna Silvestri, is his ability to grasp the fragility of nature when it seems to be about to become apocalyptic. In fact, his work revolves around climate change and the sense of anxiety that can be linked to it.

Sign of the Times exhibition is not the only initiative conceived during this difficult period: ArtGate Blog, explains Bianca Callegaro, is another project born in the middle of the pandemic. Due to the suspension of academic activities Bianca Callegaro, Luna Silvestri and Belen De Bacco found themselves with a lot of spare time and that is why they decided to invest their creativity by writing short articles to be published in social networks and, later, on a website. The initiative has quickly reached a considerable level of interest, both in terms of readers and in terms of active participation and discussion, thus reaching the goal of the blog itself: to make sure that as many people as possible take action in favor of art. Inclusiveness is one of the strengths of the blog, according to Luna Silvestri: since the blog is not directed towards a specific artistic target, it does not have canons that could be limiting. Anyone can participate by freely communicating what he/her thinks without being conditioned by any kind of hierarchy. In other words, the project is totally open to what is interesting and original.

This, in short, is the spirit of Sign of the Times, of ArtGate Blog and, more generally, the goal of the four curators: to create a platform that aims to the future, in which the expression of creativity and artistic fruition are possible for anyone, anywhere and at any time.

Giada Franzoni