A “thinking big” work from a multifaceted, visionary artist who challenges conventions and invites the public to explore new dimensions in art. The exhibition combines painting and video to create visual short circuits that take us into an alternative reality where contrasting emotions are aroused. Nea-polis, the exhibition’s headlining city, becomes an unreal, captivating place. Caria appropriates the sense of disorientation that the city provokes and transforms it into a vision, populated by signs, noises and enigmatic games; in a kaleidoscope of bright colours and incisive strokes, which tell stories of complex and ambiguous characters. “…And this is where Naples comes into play, in its beautiful, bastard glory,” writes curator Alessandra Pacelli, “ground up in its own third-millennium badland clichés: violence and folklore, choking traffic and crumbling ruins, wretched lives and the latest hero-of-the-moment added to the celebrity figures of the Nativity scene. The city is the star but it is unrecognisable, governed by illogical practices that are impossible to deconstruct. The artist works on this sense of disorientation. He appropriates it and decodes it, manipulates it with great imagination and makes second version of if: not its double but a counter-reality made up of signs, noises and strange games of iron fists in velvet gloves.” Twenty-six works on paper are exhibited, each of which is accompanied by a storytelling text. The sequence ends outside, heading towards the last work. In a small arena in the garden, the “filmminuto” named after the exhibition plays on loop.

This is a 60-second audio-visual work in which futurist imaginings link drawings and stories, hurtling back towards an even more distant future: the Stone Age. But in this universe, some of our present-day habits just won’t go away. It is no coincidence that the fetish object of the film is physically present: the “smartstone”. The artist skilfully mixes elements of cinema, comics and expressionist art to create a political language that reflects the tensions and contradictions of contemporary society. Caria’s works are loaded with symbols and surprising details that capture the audience’s attention and prompt them to reflect on the dynamics of modern life.

Note by the artist Enrico Caria: “Artist’s note by Enrico Caria: “THINK BIG and I cling to everything that has ever made sense to me as a yokel; I whip it all up, steal it, snort it, chew it and spit back into the plate where I ate it. And before I throw it all in the trash I pick through the remains and peek around the corner: unreliable characters, unliveable cities and cataclysms… what a headache! War and peace to your souls and to those who don’t curse you so that after World War 4 we’ll do the next one with clubs… and then we’ll start again from 3: from smartstones to the big screen to the myth of the cave.2 I’ve said it all.”