Between Heaven and Earth

Between Heaven and Earth
Claudio Beorchia
The urban space is often characterized by human figures in the form of statues, sculptures, etc. But what do they see from their peculiar positions?

Claudio Beorchia
Refrontolo, Treviso, Italy
Links
Team members
Claudio Beorchia
Field of work
Visual Art, Multimedia, Photography, Other
Project category
Raising awareness
Project submitted
2023

I am an interdisciplinary artist.
I studied Art and Design at Iuav University in Venice and at the Fine Arts Academy Brera in Milan; I hold a PhD in Design Sciences at the Doctorate School of Iuav University.

With my art I try to see and represent the world in different, revealing, more meaningful ways. I do it through processes of intuition and insight, using slippages and variations of the point of view on devices, clichés, texts, elements of urban space and landscape.
I often work through relational and participatory practices, with a site-responsive and non-self-referential approach.

This approach have always pushed me to participate in residency programs. During my career I have done about thirty residencies. Many in Italy, as many in Europe, but also in China, Japan and four times in the United States. Among the residencies: at the Omi International Art Center in New York, 2017; at the Serlachius Museum in Mantta, 2018, Finland; at the “Tides Institute”, Eastport, Maine, U.S.A, 2022.

I generally work through commissions, awards and residency programs, often with museums and cultural institutions. Among the institutions that have commissioned work from me: the Museum of Contemporary Photography in Milan and the Museo Vinciano, also in Milan.
Among the solo exhibitions: “Characters and Spaces”, Artists Unlimited, Bielefeld, Germany, 2023; “Tell me a river”, at K18 Gallery, Maribor, Slovenia, 2021; “Between heaven and earth”, Museum of Contemporary Photography, Milan, Italy, 2019-2020; “Aurale”, Gallerie dell’Accademia, Venezia, Italy.
My works have also been shown in group exhibitions in prestigious venues such as the Triennale in Milan and Hangar Bicocca in Milan, or the Scuderie del Quirinale in Rome.

I was recently selected as an artist-in-residence within the European WaterLands initiative, as part of a multi-year project dealing with the restoration of the Venice Lagoon.


Niches and religious little temples, where statuettes and effigies of saints find shelter, characterize the territory of Italy and several other European countries with catholic heritage. But what do those saints see from those privileged points of view?
“Between Heaven and Earth" is a photographic project which shows what the saints, from their strategic locations, see in front of them. I developed this project with the Museum of Contemporary Photography of Milan in 2019. It took a participatory form, in an ambitious initiative that has involved the entire Lombard territory in Italy. More than 250 people participated in the project and sent us images of over 2900 landscapes seen through the eyes of the saints.

The project resulted in a major exhibition in the Museum and the substantial publication "Saintscapes." But it has also taken the form of urban walks, in which participants put themselves in the shoes of the painted and sculpted figures who inhabit historic city centers, and take photos from those peculiar points.

“Between Heaven and Earth” is part of a personal line of interdisciplinary projects that investigate landscapes and urban spaces through objective, ”automatic”, “device-based” points of view. This approach offers new and revealing perspectives on territories, devoid of clichés, personalism and self-referentiality; points of view that generate insights into the transformation of urban space, its evolution and identity, but also into the processes of degradation and abandonment, urbanization and land occupation.

Thanks to LIMA, I would like to try to articulate and decline “Between Heaven and Earth” within the context of your events. I would like to do it through relational and participatory activities in the urban space; artistic actions that foster the grafting of critical reflections and awareness in the participants and in the public.