Tapestry From An Asteroid : Raphaël Barontini

Tapestry From An Asteroid is an invitation to an historical and futuristic odyssey on the occasion of Raphaël Barontini’s first solo show in Turkey. The gallery space will be transformed with a large scale site-specific textile installation and a body of new paintings.

Recalling tapestry and large genre scenes common in history painting, Barontini’s large textile collages will present a fantasized fresco that echos with images and sounds of the "Whole-World". Those of which hint to millenary layers of cultural references, such as the city with three names: Istanbul. The rich and dense history of the city located at the crossroads of worlds and peoples was a major inspiration in the production of this new body of works. 

Coming from everywhere, a place that we do not know or a space that does not exist yet, the portraits of Raphaël Barontini form a corpus of hybrid figures summoning mixed images and references. The gallery will become the landing runway of pictorial comets, traces of a future under construction. 

At the crossroads of languages and techniques, the singular pictorial practice of Raphaël Barontini integrates a classical practice of painting as well as the omnipresent use of new technologies and various printing methods. The environment proposed by the artist will be accompanied by a sound piece co-produced with New-York based musician and rapper Mike Ladd.