BETO SHWAFATY

1977, born in Sao Paulo, Brazil,

where he lives and works.

IN RESIDENCE at

ECO E NARCISO,

Provincia di Torino

April-May 2012

The artistic practice of Beto Shwafaty departs from an interest on ʻdesignsʼ

of specific cultural and sociopolitical contexts. The materializations of his projects can be considered as hybrid units of information, composed with a diversity of art languages and assumed as possibilities to generate (or recover) specific sets of knowledge.

Considering art projects under the lens of an expanded and complex notion

of ready-made and site specificity, Shwafaty tries to instigate spectatorʼs awareness about certain dynamics and questions regarding representation, validation and mediation within given socio-cultural structures. This process informs productive activities that

reflect a broader interest in art as propositive and constructive structures: as processes of production and distribution of knowledge, techniques and communication that explores critical reflections on institutional, public and social levels.

About choosing Eco e Narciso

While Shwafaty’s project is focused in a specific episode of Piedmont’s industrial history, it also spans to many other localities and regions of Italy. Thus, as he plans to spend most of the time in settings of Piedmont region to conduct his research, nevertheless, some

dislocations will be necessary. In this sense, Eco e Narciso’s nomadic structure and hybrid nature, as also its program informed by a sensibility to local issues and contexts, seems to the artist the perfect environment in which to conduct the project of residency and research, that by the nature of its own topics of interest and subjects, spreads itself

throughout many layers of urban fabrics as also national regions in Italy.

The exploration of formal and programmatic dialogues between minimalism (as visual and abstract language), product design and corporate spheres (as material and social productions) will provide the artist materials to produce a context-specific installation. Later in the end, a video and archival installation to offer acknowledgments on specific and historical relations between industrial design, computer technology, minimalism and immaterial capitalism.

www.shwafaty.org