Masbedo Masbedo
two-screen video installation, 5ʼ30ʼ, dimensions variable
The jury awards Masbedo with the work A s h:
"For the design importance in the production of the work, the achievement of a formal vision and an almost pictorial elegance, for the contemporaneity and refinement of their video images that intersect with other languages."
Nicolò Masazza (Milan, 1973), Jacopo Bedogni (Sarzana, La Spezia,1970). They live in Milan, where their artistic collaboration began in 1999.
Nature versus man. Faith versus nature. There is a sublime tension flowing between extreme pae-sages, both wonderful and hostile, and a huma-nity lost in its nitty-gritty. Seeking settings in wild corners of the world, video artists Masbedo pushed themselves to the slopes of the erupting volcano in the small town of Vik, Iceland, to make A s h.
The focus is on man's helplessness (or incompleteness) in the face of cosmic chaos. Day mingles with night; the air is just toxic ash. In the struggle for survival, nature wins the day; its power is superior to any form of rational control. Not even the consolation of faith can help the few inhabitants gathered in prayer in the small village church, the only desolate bastion of human creation.