Mario Arlati: Incomplete Flags and…, Cortina d'Ampezzo

Contini Art Gallery hosts at its venue in Cortina d'Ampezzo the exhibition Incomplete Flags and... by Mario Arlati. The display presents a series of recent works develops from a project supported by the European Union, representing a clear homage to the work of American artist Jasper Johns. An unequivocal and immediately identifiable symbol, the flag has to be conceived as a message of power, community and culture. Hence, a symbol of unity, but at the same time it is also a symbol of fragmentation, as revealed by the very concept of unfinished. Arlati places at the center of his whole poetics the term incomplete, which highlights the active role of the audience, who is invited by the artist to complete the work with their own gaze and interpretation. It is almost as if the artist’s purpose was to make each one of us standing in front of his Incomplete Flags feeling like we were the last man destined to fill that void and to reestablish a primordial need of unity, born out from the very concept of Nation.