Our souls at night
[24.02—05.04.2025]
Umberto Di Marino, Naples, IT

Group exhibition with Omar Castillo Alfaro, Guendalina Cerruti, Gwen, Miriam Marafioti, Margherita Mezzetti, Gabriella Siciliano, Yulia Zinshtein

“The project is a global microhistory that seeks to capture the disillusionment of a generation—those born between the 1990s and 2000s—who grew up in a world without walls or borders, yet were the first to experience the weight of a failed linear vision of progress. They witnessed a technological evolution that was meant to bridge racial, sexual, political, and social divides, only to find themselves trapped in a global village where time has collapsed into an eternal present, overshadowed by an oppressive fear of the future. Instead of the promised optimism and sustainability, they are left navigating a fragmented landscape, where both human and natural bodies exist in a state of perpetual transition. Synthetic, digital, human, natural—matter itself transcends the rigid categories of modernity, becoming a vessel for generational nostalgia, a patchwork of dissonant yet contemporary narratives that refuse to coalesce into a single truth. What remains is a deep-seated melancholy, a longing for a past that feels increasingly unreachable, and a mourning not only for what has been lost but for what could have been—an ache for unrealized possibilities and broken dreams. This generation seems caught in an endless liminal state, hesitating at the threshold of an irreversible action, remaining Forever Overhead. Through different artistic approaches, the exhibition explores various dimensions of loneliness.

Yulia Zinshtein’s paintings depict caricatured, sketch-like figures at café tables, embodying a struggle with human connection, while Margherita Mezzetti’s collages of pale, smooth, almost surreal bodies merge everyday imagery with elements of fictional narratives, evoking a sense of unease. Miriam Marafioti paints a cartographic reality that blends real and scientific landscapes, distorting them with acidic colors and invasive natural elements. A darker and more unsettling vision emerges in the works of Gwen, who immerses the viewer in nightmarish imagery of monsters and witches, while Omar Castillo Alfaro revisits ancestral practices from his homeland, confronting the enduring impact of identity traumas in post-colonial narratives. Gabriella Siciliano’s works capture the difficulty of leaving behind the liminal space between adolescence and adulthood, depicting stuffed animals and carousel creatures at rest, a theme echoed in Guendalina Cerruti’s use of childhood toys—sparkling beads intertwined with a raw DIY aesthetic. In these sometimes diverging stories, there seems to be no room for a future that is no longer something to look forward to with hope or build with effort, but rather a weight that this generation prefers to leave behind—to those who came before them.”