As the water falls… is a video-installation first created in 2011 in the FRAC gallery, in Biella, Piemonte, Italy. It was inspired by the marking coexistence of nature and urban space in the city of Biella.
The city, a former wool producer on a big scale, is now rather empty, and its abbandonned industrial buildings that still stand on the riverside are being taken over progressively by the nature. The past marks the present. And all that happens with the uninterrupted accompaniment of the river's rumble.
As the water falls… is a solo performance captured during 11h. The dancer-performer plays on "bringing" the river into the former factory. While she stays there closed for 11h, she experiences the mix of influences and meanings: industry, nature, space, sound, light, smells, memories, past and present.
F.R.A.C. (Fondo Regionale d'Arte Contemporanea)is a reproducible concept of a centre/gallery of the contemporary art, existing outside of the main art-dealing cities, in order to “decentralise” the exhibition and commerce of the art pieces, and to “bring the contemporary art closer” of the public living outside of the big cities.
The concept was born in France and reproduced in Piedmont by Francesco Manacorda, the director of Artissima, Turin, in collaboration with Michelangelo Pistoletto, one of the main creators of the Arte Povera.
The Piedmont FRAC is hosted by the Pistoletto’s Foundation, in Biella, Italy. It occupies one of the buildings of a former thread factory, and is divided in two different though connected thematically exhibitions.
One of the exhibitions contains the contemporary pieces of art that belong to the FRAC collection, mostly works of a young generation of artists. The second exhibition hosts the works that residents of Pistoletto’s Foundation prepare especially, in relation to the thematic of the first part, space and context of the exhibition space.