π The Irrational City 2.0

THE IRRATIONAL CITY 2.0 by Paolo Cesaretti and Antonella Dedini is a five meters high light installation, situated at the entrance of the city of Venice.

It is a site-specific work that intervenes within the perimeter of the Santa Lucia station, intended as the point of transition between the mainland and the Venetian lagoon. It’s a misregistered presence with respect to the context in which it is located and it looks like a sort of visual accident. The work is placed on the wall of an electrical substation on the edge of the tracks at the end of the platforms: the deep red lighted π hits the flows of travelers arriving and departing as a surprising element that raises questions. In this city, what is irrational? The rigid flows of tourism or the uprising flow of water? The project site is the urban junction where the forced adaptation of two opposite systems - the contemporary time of the mainland and the suspended time of the laguna - makes the accepted logic intruding in a physical unaltered structure.

THE IRRATIONAL CITY 2.0 - presented at the XII Venice Biennale as part of the exhibition Traces Of Centuries & Future Steps - was visible at the Venice station until the end of November 2013. Photo and video_ Lorenzo Pennati