Artist: Nora Turato
Exhibition title: Opening Night
Venue: Juliette Jongma, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
Date: September 9 – October 14, 2017
Photography: all images copyright and courtesy of the artist and Juliette Jongma, Amsterdam
With a fierce facial expression, utterly female appearance, determining pose, and a vomiting pace, artist Nora Turato forcefully spits out slices of daily conversations, literature, social media posts, politics and (personal) frustration, that merge into an impulsive, passionate and melodic soundscape within her performances. A stand-up poetic slam, that flirts with Hip-Hop and Punk avant la lettre, moves between citing and singing, verbalizes rhythmic beats, and challenges conventions within the artistic and social sense.
Opening Night is the title of Nora Turato’s first solo exhibition at Galerie Juliette Jongma and fuses the artist’s dazzling melting pot of staged tones of voice and text bites with a spatial-based practice. It’s only since recent that the artist has been working with the concept of an exhibition alongside the performances, which allows her to involve a more Fluxus based attitude around her staged persona. She treats the objects – which are often castings of non-pretentious objects of everyday use like cheeses, stools or tools, as miniature stages to uplift her physical presence and navigate the viewer’s imagination in her absence. These objects inherent subtle references of feminist empowerment within the domestic and day to day sense, though take on a deliberate sensual aesthetic to discomfort and questioning the latter. Here the “things” and texts-bits take on the ambiguous role of being activated by a performance, extend its meaning in time, and playfully discomfort autonomy. Throughout the period of the exhibition, on an almost daily basis, one performance will be held at different locations within the space, exploring the meaning of context within the midst of what is being said.
Being a musician at first, and later educated as a graphic designer, Turato’s quest for experiment within the genres has led her into the fine art context wherein she most often operates nowadays. She currently resides at the Rijksakademie van Beeldende Kunsten in Amsterdam, and still records music under the name ‘Turato91’. She has had performances in 2017 at LambdaLambdaLambda in Prishtina, Centre d’Art Contemporain Genève, Bonner Kunstverein, Kölnischer Kunstverein, NAK Neuer Aachener Kunstverein and KW Berlin, in 2016 at Kunstfort bij Vijfhuizen and in 2015 at the Venice Biennale, Lithuanian pavilion.
Text by: Jeanine Hofland
Nora Turato, this is not funny! it’s hysterical, Performance, 2017, Massive palissander, paint and plywood, Massive palissander, headphones and paint, 206cm x 60cm x 39cm, 49,5cm x 30cm x 30cm
Nora Turato, this is not funny! it’s hysterical, Performance, 2017, Massive palissander, paint and plywood, Massive palissander, headphones and paint, 206cm x 60cm x 39cm, 49,5cm x 30cm x 30cm
Nora Turato, u don’t get to me, 2017, Steel frame, Jiffy steamer, aluminium mirror and cooling element, 119cm X 84cm
Nora Turato, you can always tell something when a woman is overdressed either she’s an outsider, or she’s insane, 2017, Aluminium mirror, rubber and suction cups, 119cm x 84,5cm x 11cm
Nora Turato, you can always tell something when a woman is overdressed either she’s an outsider, or she’s insane, 2017, Aluminium mirror, rubber and suction cups, 119cm x 84,5cm x 11cm
Nora Turato, Opening Night, Performance, 2017
Nora Turato, so i do my thing do my thing feels dirty but it goes away, Performance, 2017, Handmade rope with print on chiffon, 400cm x 12cm, 177cm x 123cm
Nora Turato, Opening Night, Performance, 2017
Nora Turato, Opening Night, Performance, 2017