ROOM04: MOULTING — Erica Curci

People are not just people. They are an awful lot of microbes too.

The superficial layer of our body is a place of continuous exchanges, it is an in-between space, a threshold and passage, not only a place of transition but also of transaction.

The corners and crevices of every human being is inhabitate by organisms in continuous communication with “us” and with others living in our environment, an invisible communication, from body to body. Erica Curci wants to make this connection tangible and material through a ritual that involves the reproduction and analysis of the epidermis of human beings who will come into contact with her and her work, using silicone casts and petri dishes, bringing skin-to-skin contact to being contact between people.

Displayed in ROOM04:

MY NEW SECOND SKIN (2021)
Latex suit printed with tetrachlorethylene solution

“My new second skin was created for a performance with a strong connection to the aquatic world, my role was to create a connection between that layer that we naively identify as the “border” of our body and that of some marine species, creating the beginning of what will be for me the production of chimera skins, the result of a union between human skin and those of other species”.


EXUVIA (2022)
Acetobacter Xilynum culture and bacterial cellulose

“The showcased project belongs to a research of artistic production which has as a focal research point the most external casing of the human body, the skin. Conceptually the work is born from the analysis and re-elaboration of the ecdysis, the biological loss and reformation process of an organism superficial layer tissue, which happens in reptiles. The skin, the superficial layer of integument laid by snakes it’s called exuviae, because snakes sese exuunt, namely they undress. The experimentation of bio materials, through bacterial cultures and substances of vegetal origin, has as objective the production of tissues that are as similar to epidermal ones as possible, which can take the role of a second skin. The project is therefore conceived in perpetual evolution”.


DERMA (2018)
Second skin garments in silicone rubber, catalyst, flesh pigment, collagen

“Proteins are produced by genes and are the key to life, responsible for maintaining living structures and their mechani- sms. During the analysis of the epidermal tissue, I selected the main compositional protein element, collagen *.
In a second phase, I self-produced an artificial membrane inside which there is a percentage of the same molecule.
The membrane then became the material for creating wearable sculptures, with the color of human skin”.

BIO

Erica Curci, 1994, is an artist based in Milan. She graduated in Design – Fashion Culture and Technologies – from Academy of Fine Arts in Rome. In 2017 she started attending the course of Performing Arts at the school ‘’Cònia’’ directed by Socìetas Raffaello Sanzio. 
Her artistic research dialogues with the field of biology and the relative processes of animal and plant world, in order to find a connection between species. Analyzing the outermost layer of the human body, the skin, which at the same time separates us and connects us with the outside, she investigates the relationship ­between (human) bodies and microbes. 
In the Anthropocene era she feels the need to find new organic artistic mediums, which at the end of their life can become compost.  
Based on current scientific theories and ­discoveries, her work is placed in the area of ­BioArt, using ­microbiology techniques and biomaterials to ­create artworks. 
 
Her work has been exhibited at the ADI Design Museum of Milan, MACRO – ­Contemporary Art Museum of Rome, Fotograf Gallery Praha, Harlesden High Street Gallery London, Plateforme Gallery Paris. 
The DERMA project has been selected and published by Vogue Talents, A.I. Artisanal Intelligence and ­Flewid-Fashion&ArtBoo