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Approaching Paths 2022

III EDITION- APPROACHING PATHS: CONTEMPORARY ARTISTS FACING THE CHISTIAN MISTERY

For the THIRD edition of APPROACHING PATHS: CONTEMPORARY ARTISTS FACING THE CHRISTIAN MISTERY, THE EMMAUS DINNER is the theme that was chosen.

The language of images has always been fundamental in both spiritual and cultural growth of the Church. That is why the aim of the PATHS initiative is that to try to fill the communication gap between art and faith, a gap that was created during the previous century. In a word, this project wants to show to the artistic world and to the ecclesial community how the contemporary artistic language can interpret mysteries of the Christian faith.

It is according to PATHS that some of the artists are previously selected - young people who are chosen according to their language maturity. Those young artists have the chance to have a meeting experience with the Christian spirituality and through these paths they can reach an important development of their artistic expression.

The aim of the project is, in fact, that to respect the contemporaneity of the young people involved, but it also tries to give them a support over their artistic research that absorbs Christian contents, which are not easy to understand.

The PATHS initiative recommends a deep involvement of young artists among different stages. On these stages it is suggested an accurate itinerary into what is spiritual, iconographic and artistic. All of this has to deal with the Catholic figurative sensitivity. Besides, those young artists can have a confrontation with p. Andrea Dall’Asta s.j. and Claudia Manenti about how to better present a devotional image in a contemporary language.

The cornerstone of this initiative is the retirement to the Verna Sanctuary (AR), the place where Francis received his stigmas in 1224. In that place, with the lead of Padre Francesco Brasa, everyone will have the chance to come closer with God.

The main theme proposed by the III edition of PATHS is precisely the encounter with the Risen One. The results of that will be exposed at the DEVOTIO 2022. In short, participants will have to interpret the theme of the EMMAUS DINNER and the meeting with Jesus Christ made by two of his disciples back to Emmaus from Jerusalem. The key elements of the Christian experience are the path, the meeting, the dinner and the annunciation. All those elements are gathered in a single Gospel page to which the artists are so called to refer in order to return an image that better represents the encounter with Christ.
As already shown with the two previous PATHS editions, bringing back art and faith is possible and, at the same time, necessary. So, that is why the Church needs images that can deeply express its spirituality. Moreover, artists have the opportunity to discover the richness of the Christian religiosity.

What was said in 1955 by the cardinal Lercaro is still effective, even nowadays. He stated “Each moment of the story tells about the God’s praise through the language of the living people”.

Selected artists

Carlos Lalvay Estrada

Carlos Lalvay Estrada Devotio 2021

22 July
1985 Visual artist

Born and raised in Maná - Cotopaxi - Ecuador, at the age of 14 he came to Geneva, to his mother. It is here that he decided to stay and to work.
Designer by instinct, during his lifetime he compared himself with many different forms of expression such as video, music and sculpture.
In 2012 he established, together with Pietro Repetto, the PICA project. This project merges illustration together with the cyanotype printing and by doing so they create paper and fabric hand prints in unique pieces or limited editions.
Moreover, in these years he has attended many different exhibitions in Italy, but it is thanks to his work “Costelación” that he received the art award at the Biennale giovani Monza 2017.
In 2018/2019 he also received a mention from the curatorial team of the San Fedele Prize.

LA CENNA DI EMMAUS

Gold leaf, oil pastels, acrylic, pencil, paper on canvas. Wooden frame
25 x 30 cm
2021

South American artist Carlos Lalvay Estrada stages the story from the Gospel of Luke as if it were a luminous theophany. From an uneven white background, the face of a young man emerges in the distance, as if bursting forth from a distant time and space. On a closer plane we recognise two hands as they break a loaf of bread on a table symbolically painted bright red. The profiles of the faces of the two disciples at the sides frame the scene, leaving an open space for us to witness the event. At the top, small clouds made of very thin golden threads seem to rise upwards, sowing a fine shower of gold. It is as if the gesture of the breaking of the bread corresponded to the appearance of the Holy Spirit, enabling the disciples to recognise in that man the Son of God. The Spirit of God descends whenever a man makes gestures of sharing, solidarity and fraternity. If the white colour of the background symbolises that the moment of recognition is a true epiphany of the divine, a grace that illuminates our gaze, the red of the table instead indicates that this offering takes place with the very blood of life.

Andrea Dall'Asta s.j.

Arvin Golrokh

Arvin Golrokh

11/03/1992
Nationality: Iranian
Residency at Torino

- 2019: Master's degree in painting at the Albertina’s Academy
- 2016: Bachelor's degree at the Albertina ’s Academy
- 2010: Artistic High School Diploma (Tehran)

Awards 2019

• he gained the first position at the Mestre painting contest of Venice 2019
• he gained the second position and the Nocivelli’s award, in Brescia 2019
• he gained the third position at the San Giusto Canavese 2018
• he obtained a scholarship at the Mestre painting competition

Exhibitions

• in 2020  he took the group exhibition “In our eyes”, with Crag Gallery, Torino
• 2019 artwork acquired by the Cà Pesaro's collection and the Venice Civic Museums for the Mestre Prize
• 2019 Personal exhibition of winners of the Nocivelli’s contest, at Palazzo Martinengo Brescia
• 2019 artwork acquired by Gazzettino of Venice
• 2019 “Bipolarism passion”, group exhibition with catalog at the Fondazione Bevilacqua La Masa, palazzetto Tito, Venice
•2019 work of art in exhibition with catalog at the FISAD second edition at the Accademia Albertina (Torino)
• 2019 “A metal brush”, group exhibition at the previous Ditta Gallo Bartolomeo, Torino
• 2018 “Torino Here4”, group exhibition at La Cavallerizza (Torino)
• 2018 Paratissima, Torino
• 2017 “Torino Here3 Clap”, group exhibition at La Cavallerizza (Torino)

LA CENA IN EMMAUS

Oil on canvas
70 x 70 cm
2021

Arvin Golrokh's interpretation is highly dramatic. With a mellow, rapid brushstroke, almost conceived as nervous flickers of matter that coagulate to create coloured spots of great expressive power, Arvin creates an interior space in which the two disciples are seated at a table with Christ in the centre who, with a calm and solemn gesture, is breaking bread. While the man on the left raises his gaze upwards, pointing to the sky with the forefinger of his left hand, the other looks at Christ's face, showing surprise, astonishment and wonder, but also fear and distrust. Above them, a kind of cloud in the bright colours of blue, red and yellow animates the scene with strength and vitality. We do not know its origin, we only know that it suddenly bursts into the room. The Spirit of God intervenes to transform that bread into the body of Christ that will become our food, so that we in turn become nourishment for others. The young artist presents us with the culminating moment of the scene, the instant of maximum tension that shatters that tired and resigned sadness that characterises our lives: Christ is truly the bread descended from heaven so that our existence can regain confidence and hope.

Andrea Dall'Asta s.j.

Alessandro Sanna

Alessandro Sanna

Author and illustrator.
I believe in things that do not exist, that is way I draw them.

Alessandro is an author and illustrator of books with figures. Now he lives and works in Mantova. He cooperates with different Italian and international publishing houses and he also exposes his works at both group and personal exhibitions. For three times Alessandro won the “Andersen Prize”, an award organized by the Italian magazine, which has the same name of that prize. The aim of that was the promotion of children's literature: in 2006 he won with the best artwork book, in 2009 and 2014 he won as best illustrator. In 2014 the magazine Lo Straniero awarded him. The director of the magazine at that time was Goffredo Fofi.

In 2013 he realised a book, which title was “Fiume lento”. The book was published by Rizzoli in several different countries: Italy, Usa, Spain; Germany, Czech Republic, China.
In 2019 he published, always with Rizzoli, “Come questa pietra, il libro di tutte le guerre , which was published in the Usa, China, Taiwan. That same book was selected at the White Raven in 2019.
He was also an important illustrator for Vanity Fair France and for Gioia magazine.
Illustrator and drawing professor at the Accademia di Belle Arti of Bologna and Verona, but also Italian candidate at the Hans Christian Andersen Award 2016.

LA CENA DI EMMAUS

Watercolour on panel
25 x 17 cm each panel
2021

Alessandro Sanna develops in a sequence of images a true narrative logic in which the story of the disciples of Emmaus unfolds according to punctual episodes. He therefore does not dwell on the central scene of the Gospel passage, but rather intends to render a narrative in time. Thus, from the initial landscape in which they are immersed in a forest in which we glimpse the two disciples as if they were lost, in the next scene, with its bright colours turning from pink to yellow, we see a sunset in which the trees thin out to show Christ approaching the two disciples. The narrative continues showing us the three pilgrims, caught on the verge of entering the inn. It is evening, it is now dark, and the small building appears as a welcoming place of refuge. If the next scene recounts the moment of the sharing of bread and wine in an original way, placing the surprised and bewildered faces of the disciples and the fi gure of Christ as he breaks the bread in panels against a starry sky, the next image shows the two disciples together with Christ in an interior space, even though this room opens onto a lush nature. If in the penultimate scene the disciples rush to Jerusalem to announce that Christ is risen, in the final image we contemplate the city of Jerusalem seen from above, wrapped in a splendid starry mantle. Every single scene is like a poem imbued with colour, in which the drama is suspended. Sanna accompanies us into spaces and times that have rediscovered a hope that we are probably losing today.

Andrea Dall'Asta s.j.

Norberto Spina

Norberto Spina

Urban artist
One of the concepts that I want to express with my art is / suburbs /.

He works and lives in Milan
2014 - 2017 Painting degree at the Brera Academy.
2016 - 2017 Erasmus at the Barcelona University

EXHIBITIONS
2020
- February, group exhibition “Frammenti di storia” with the “Premio San Fedele Arte” finalist - Fondazione San Fedele, Milano 2019
- December, group exhibition and he gained the third position of the “San Fedele Arte” Award - Fondazione San Fedele, Milano
- March, group exhibition “Poetiche a Confronto ”, MO.CA, Brescia
- February / April, residency at Fondazione San Fedele, Milano
2018
- October, group exhibition winning “X Premio Nocivelli”, Accademia di Belle Arti Santa Giulia, Brescia
- “X Premio Nocivelli” prize for the second position, Verolanuova, Brescia
2017
- November, finalist of the Biennale RomArt, Stadio di Domiziano, Rome
2016
- November, group exhibition “Via Panizza 4 - INEDITI”, Via Panizza 4, Milan
- November, finalist “Premio Arte 2016”, Palazzo Reale, Milan
- October, group exhibition “Street dreams”, Courtfield Garden, London
- Giugno, group exhibition “Sketch”, Galleria Pisacane Arte, Milan
2015
- November, personal exhibition “NOBA WALLS X OREA MALIÀ ”, Orea Malià, Milan

Wall painting, acrylics, oil paint and marker on canvas
Triptych 38.3x 29 cm each panel
2021

Norberto Spina's work is divided into two main phases. At first, the young artist performs a layering operation, superimposing layers of paint and using salvaged materials. In a second stage he subtracts, scratching the surface with blunt objects and abrasive paper. The work is thus presented as the result of a long and painful process, in which Norberto takes the canvas to its limits, cutting it, wounding it and then caring for it, protecting it. His Supper at Emmaus consists of three works that are highly poetic in their evocative and allusive character. The young artist does not intend to describe a story, but rather wants to suggest it through details. Thus, if in the first scene he presents architecture characterised by the presence of a long portico that makes explicit reference to the porticos of San Luca in Bologna, in the second canvas he presents three pairs of shoes thrown to the ground. The story ends with two hands caught breaking a loaf of bread. The canvas has a background tending to red. The drawing is nervous and scratchy, as if to evoke the suffered and difficult character of the disciples' descent from Jerusalem and their sudden recognition. Through details, the narrative unfolds in a journey that finds its deep meaning in a sharing. And that journey takes place in the spaces in which we live, along those porticos, so that that bread can be redistributed in the paths of our lives, day by day.

Andrea Dall'Asta s.j.