Jacopo Benassi. The eyes can see what the mouth can not say

the eyes can see what the mouth can not say was the name of a magazine by Jacopo Benassi and Federico Pepe.
It showed a series of photos, portraits of musicians, taken by Benassi during live performances at Btomic.
Btomic was an iconic, underground 70 square meters club in La Spezia, Italian small town in the area of Genova.
Imagine: the touristic Italian riviera, very close to Cinque Terre.

Btomic was run by a group of friends: Gianluca Petriccione, Lorenzo D’Anteo, Roberto Buratta and Jacopo Benassi.
Opened 2011, closed 2015 for lack of money, hosted many performances and live concerts. Among the musicians, Teho Tehardo, Jozef van Wissem, Chris Imler, Julia Kent , Mary Ocher, Lydia Lunch, F.M Palumbo, Embryo, Lori Goldston, Hugo Rice, Tav Falco, Carla Bozulich, Andrea Belfi, Lubomyr Melnyk, Ernesto Tommasini, Matt Eliot, Z’EV, Sir Richard Bishop, Six Organs Admittance, Emidio Clementi, Khan, Mangiacassette, Baby Dee, Eugene Chadbourne, and many more.

THE EYES CAN SEE WHAT THE MOUTH CAN NOT SAY is now a book in which musicians performing are never seen. It is a series of images of people looking. I would rather say, contemplating. The Latins said contemplatio – the prefix con expressesing a connection, and templum denoting a defined area.

People in Benassi’s images are strongly connected and the area is defined. There is a geography made of scraped walls, images inside the images, signs on the walls, details of furniture, symbols. People inhabiting this geography are looking and listening.
A guy with a Sonic Youth t-shirt stands next to an older lady with glasses and a floral cleaning-lady-dress.
The relationship between identity and place is one of the most recurrent themes in geography, so I wonder what do they have in common? I love the way the stand harmonically next to each other.
This is a work about an aural landscape, by Jacopo Benassi, the landscape photographer.
– Giulia Zorzi

On the opening event, Jacopo Benassi will launch the book THE EYES CAN SEE WHAT THE MOUTH CAN NOT SAY, published by Peperoni Books.
Design Federico Pepe, edited by Giulia Zorzi / Micamera

Jacopo Benassi (La Spezia, 1970)
Collaborates with various magazines. In 2005 he participated to aphotography at Changing role gallery in Neaples, in 2006 and 2007 at Artissima in Turin. In 2007 his work was included in the exhibition Vade retro. Arte e omossessualità, da von Gloeden a Pierre et Gilles (Art and homosexuality, from von Gloeden to Pierre et Gilles) curated by Viittorio Sgarbi and Eugenio Viola. In 2009 the agency 1861 United released his monumental monograph The Ecology of Image.
In the same year, his work was exhibited at FotoGrafia International Festival in Rome.
In 2010 Benassi took part to  no soul for sale at Tate Modern  (London, UK) with Le Dictateur; the event was curated by Maurizio Cattelan and Massimiliano Gioni. In 2011, he had a solo exhibition at Zelle gallery in Palermo and created talkinass paper and records, a label that produced a magazine and live CDs by international artists from the underground scene.
Benassi has collaborated with filmmakers and writers such as Paolo Sorrentino, Daniele Ciprì, Asia Argento and Maurizio Maggiani. From 2013 to 2015 his work has been exhibited at SIFest, photography festival near Rimini. In 2014 he presented his magazine at the Palais de Tokyo in Paris in collaboration with Le Dictateur in Milan.
He collaborates with artist Federico Pepe at COCO, a videoart and music project.
In 2016 he conceived No title yet! – a performance involving photography in collaboration with the collective theatre group Kinkaleri.
At the end of 2016 he released, together with Paolo Sorrentino, The Irrelevant Aspects: the Academy Award-winning director created 23 shot stories inspired by 23 portraits taken by Jacopo Benassi.

Collaborations / magazines:
dapper dan (Greece)
crush fanzine (Paris, New York )
Parterre de Rois (Milan)
Purple Magazine (Paris)
GQ Italia
GQ Russia
Rolling Stone Italia
Wired Italia
Wired America
Riders Italia
Almaviva / Le Figaro (Paris)
11FREUNDE (Berlin)

books
Dying in Venice – Bruno, Venezia, 2016
UNLOCKED (AAVV) – Atopos, Athens, 2015
MY Posters – Quinlan, Bologna, 2013
Mein schwules Auge 9 (AAVV)- Konkursbuch, Berlin, 2012
Muccassassina (AAVV)- Postcart, Rome, 2010
The Ecology of Image – 1861 United Press, Milan, 2008

Opening reception and music performance by Jacopo Benassi on Thursday, April 20 at 7pm

Vai alla guida d'arte di Milan