like the grave of a stone, like the cradle of a star – TRT 27:44
“Like the Grave of a Stone, Like the Cradle of a Star”
(Nell’insonnia di avere in sorte la luce)
Written and directed by Giorgiomaria Cornelio and Lucamatteo Rossi
(Ireland, Italy, 2017, 27 min)
“Like the grave of a stone, like the cradle of a star” is a journey between Italy and Ireland, an interdisciplinary atlas of different languages and places that display the possibilities of contemporary cinema as a place of endless exploration. This movie (filmed mostly in Ireland, in archaeological sites of interest as Hill of Tara or Glendalough) is an attempt to present an idea of cinema before the invention of cinema itself, connecting the mythical Ogham alphabet (engraved on the surface of the stones) with the practice of experimental cinema (cameraless movies) and also with Italian avant-garde artists like Antonio Burri, Paolo Gioli, Corrado Costa, Emilio Villa, Stefano Scodanibbio, Osvaldo Licini. By doing that, we tried to create a map of meanings, inspired by Aby Warburg’s “Mnemosyne Atlas”.
Not only are our correspondences vicinities but also approaches, encounters, letters, proposals of etymologies: if the sky is a huge poem, the Braille pierced on the night of the film will be its Celestial Alphabet. Hence, let us imagine that we still are at the beginning. Let us imagine that a magician of an old legend traces a fable that can be read as a geography of commonalities and migrations. A fable that can be read as the memorial of our voyage where the Ogham encounters the pictorial rooms of Magdalo Mussio: atlantes, sewn papers, tarots that we have spread along the places where we have lived for nine months. Let us also imagine that the wizard, waking up, carries objects recollected in the memory of the gestures performed with them: the stone and the star outlined in the drawing of the carpet.
Following these three figures and combining different techniques and formats (digital, analogical, pinhole, painted celluloid, vhs), we have invented our film, which is the second chapter of an ideal “trilogy of the wanderers” started with “Ogni roveto un dio che arde” (Every bush a God that Burns), presented during the “Mostra Internazionale del Nuovo Cinema di Pesaro –Pesaro Film Festival” and recently selected in the 200-shortlisted works of the Rencontres Internationales Paris/Berlin. The film is also connected with an exhibition of expanded cinema that includes the international artists portrayed in the film (Magdalo Mussio, Alberto Burri, Emilio Villa, James Stephens, Aby Warburg, Osvaldo Licini, the soundtrack by Stefano Scodanibbio…) and that has been presented in Italy (Galleria Philosoparte/ Ancona, Festival Cinematica 2018, Mole Vanvitelliana, Pesaro Film Festival), Ireland (“Performative Arts Today”, Trinity College, Science Gallery Dublin) and Czech Republic (Marienbad Film Festival)
GIORGIOMARIA CORNELIO (14th January 1997) and LUCAMATTEO ROSSI (3rd December 1996) founded the atlas Navegasión in 2016. The same year they presented the film “Every bush a god that burns” on the 52nd edition of the International Film Festival of Pesaro and won the ISPEC CINEMA Special Award Locarno 2016 (the film has been also included in the selection of Rencontres Internationales Paris/Berlin 2018). In parallel with their second film (“Nell’insonnia di avere in sorte la luce”), they curated the exhibition “Like the grave of a stone, like the cradle of a star” which was hosted in the Italian gallery Philosofarte, in the Marienbad Film Festival and in Trinity College Dublin, where they both study. They also collaborated with Franko B in the performance “Playtime” and the collective exhibition “Young at heart, old on the skin”. In 2019, they curated an Openshop -hosted by Science Gallery Dublin- and they presented an installation during the Asolo Art Film Festival. In the same year, the also inaugurated their first theatrical work (“Elagabalus”) for “Rassegna Crisalidi”. Giorgiomaria is also a writer. His articles have been published in blogs and magazines such as ArtNoise, Nazione Indiana, Le Parole e le Cose, Anterem, Il Manifesto, Il Tascabile, Doppiozero. He won the prize Opera Prima (Anterem) with the work La Promessa Focaia. He is the curator of the online film catalogue “La Camera Ardente” (The burning Camera).
17 Days Video Series 