RISERVATO (RTO)
'He took a pencil from his desk and waved it towards me. "If I give you this gift," he said, "that means 'I’m territorial here." But it also means, "have a territory and I am no threat to yours." All we’re doing is fixing the frontier. I say to you, "Here I put my gift. I’m not going any further." It would be an offence if I put my gift too far.' – (Bruce Chatwin, The Songlines 1987).
Riservato, abbreviated to RTO, is a charged term in the context of rural Malta; it is inevitable and it defines boundaries. The art works in this series are ‘loaded’ with an RTO sign. A sign that deters as much as it instigates transgression; it engenders a closed space and yet it opens up multiple paths of deterritorialisation.
RTO forms the basis of my territorial practice; a ubiquitous abbreviation that cuts through space and attempts to slow down or impede movement. RTO I and RTO II encapsulate 'blurred boundaries' in the form of portable, transgressive museum pieces and display cabinets containing traces of 'enclosed' spaces reterritorialised into the original 'reserved' site.
RTO I, wood, glass, stone, chrome, acrylic paint, text, 45cm x 45cm, 2014
RTO II - wood, glass, mirror, stone, polymethyl methacrylate, chrome, acrylic paint, text 45cm x 45cm, 2014
Fragments of 'restricted' places
RTO I and RTO II installation, Contemporary Inside, Venue 18, Msida, Malta, 2018
RTO I and RTO II installation, Contemporary Inside, Venue 18, Msida, Malta, 2018
RT-O (RT-Open) is a more direct and explicit response to ambiguous RTO territory since it deconstructs physical boundaries and subsequently takes the form of a fully exposed display case. RT-O can be opened and closed by the viewers which are also allowed to touch and relocate the artefacts contained within as they become curators themselves.
'Open' RTO territory is a space which is deceivingly accessible, comparable to artefacts in a museum which can be accessed and experienced from a distance through a politically-loaded narrative pre-established by the curators.
RT-O, wood, glass, metal brackets, polymethyl methacrylate, stainlessteel, acrylic paint, various objects, 2014
RT-O all sides closed