Audaci Montagne

2014

We thought that our whole history consisted in courageously and ceaselessly struggling against powers that were always stronger and greater than ours. The image is reversed: we now know that our reason, our research, our desires and will, our history and our power, even our consumption are infinite and that the nature confronting us is finite.

Michel Serres, Times of crisis

(…) the “mountains” are:
– a cultural and historical construct (and as such object of critique and demystification);
– a place where one is not escaping contradictions but finds additional and specific ones;
– a terrain of conflict between the uses of the territory which are diverse and incompatible;
– a repository for stories and signs of past revolts, resistances and repressions.

Wu Ming on Giap

In our era of the anthropocene, humans have become a real geological force in conflict with the Earth and her systems. This flag wants to symbolise the grassroots movements that today and in the past – in the mountainous areas of the world – struggle in creative ways for the appeasement between humans and nature, for the defence and renewal of the commons, for diversity and nonhuman rights. It stands for the struggles of all those who get active for the protection of mountains from enclosures, environmental destruction and attempts to subjugate the environment to profit in the name of a distorted notion of progress.

In this scenario, we’re intervening during the exhibition “Passi Erratici” with our resources and skills to pay tribute and to sustain those movements that stand in for desirable futures and alternative routes to the ones most of our societies are currently travelling – at the end of which above all environmental devastation and climate chaos await us.

Economy of Audaci Montagne (Daring Mountains)
The budget at the disposal for every artist or collective of artists: 2,500€ (to be used to cover fee, transport, production, etc.)
– fee for two people (11 days of work each between research, 3-day walk, site visits, production, installation): 1,200€
– support of a bottom up struggle against Alpine enclosures: 600€
– expenses for production and transport: 600€
– taxes and other expenses: 100€

Materials: printed nylon flag, ventilator, spot light, stones

Audaci Montagne was produced for the group exhibiton “Passi Erratici” (12-28.09.2014; Exilles Fortress, Susa Valley). It was curated by Stefano Riba and financed by the banking foundation Compagnia di San Paolo as part of the festival “Torino e le Alpi”.