Lac o Le Mon Foundation | Summer 2019

Below is the introductory text for my public talk:

Here with you today I would like to do an experiment investigating the possibility of glimpsing the archetype or energy matrix that sustains and vivifies form.
It all stems from an intuition, namely, that persistent in-Formation determines form, however much the human being is not accustomed to com-prehend or carry with him, in addition to the outer constitution the immaterial counterpart or said in other terms, the aesthetics of the imperceptible.

Jacob Böhme-German Lutheran philosopher, theologian, mystic and alchemist-wrote:

"There is in nature no object, created or generated, that does not also manifest its inner form through its outer image, since the inner always tends to manifest itself; thus power and form enable us to see how the eternal being, giving body to its desire, is
manifested in an image, and how it appears to us under all the different forms that we can seeand recognize: stars and elements, creatures, trees and plants. That is why the sign (the form) contains the most perfect reason."

Between 1988 and 1990 he made the series Strappi parts of different surfaces removed from foreign walls or interiors of buildings and houses, from Italian and European locations, these works derived from conceptual reflections and studies of logic.
In 1992 with Trekking he organized a project, a mountain hike for one hundred people, including artists and critics, with the intent ci to change communicative relationships in art and the role of the public. The initiative was financed through the sale of backpacks containing five works by the participating artists. Of the same year is Arrivederci Roma, decontextualizing the gallery space by asking a hostess to present three types of travel: one by plane to New York, one by train to a European city, and one at night by cab.
At the 1993 Venice Biennale he participated with Pass, intended for art insiders.
In 1994 he installed and designed Atto di Assenza for the Basel fair, it was a chaise-longue protected by a screen provided with a mask and glasses, offered to anyone who wanted to take a break from visiting the fair. Other works, refer to pause, rest and state of mind, such as: A Pause of 1990, in which he writes the word on a wall and its reading is in itself explanatory; The Way and Thinking, Wanting, Feeling of 1996, works composed of twelve and three deck chairs, respectively.
In 1995 he made Ponte, an installation in which only the access stairs appear without the central body of the bridge; the latter loses its function and the stairs frame an absence.
Dedicated to communication and time are the works Sogno of 1996, single stories of dreams that Fantin commissions from some people transmitted in an exhibition, and Privato of 1997, two voices talking on the phone, the caller is the artist as he makes the phone ring during a group exhibition. Self-Portrait of 1999, a photograph taken in front of a mirror, is an intimate introspection between self and self.
In the early 2000s Fantin creates spaces and situations in which he invites people to share the non-geographical area of sleep and dreams in the work "Astral," an area in which intense dynamics of encounter and exchange are generated, ignored or neglected by typically diurnal science and knowledge.

Later, the artist organized workshops dedicated to the relationship between art and nature, designing paths and creating works useful for the revalorization of green areas, to reaffirm the link between man and natural places. An example of this are the collective works and projects carried out as part of "Percorsi Arte e Natura": in 2010 he designed the Smeraldi Chicken Coop in the park of Villa Smeraldi in Bologna, and in 2011, also in the same park, the artist directed the creation of a series of activities aimed at the fabrication of works of aesthetic value and services, handcrafted, to improve the park, especially the area reserved for the youngest children.