Critical Essay

Prehistoric imagery in the world’s oldest country

The exhibition is a generational comparison between 29 artists exploring a common subject: dinosaurs as a shared reference to express their sensibilities and imagery.

Dinosaurs are the symbol of an extinguished, ancient, pre-human world that did not yet know verbal communication and where therefore we imagine chaos reigned. Volcanoes erupt in the background, giant meteorites hit the atmosphere. Yet, this primal mess, juxtaposed against to brutality of our so-called civilized societies, take on an ironic and often amusing significance. It is this parallelism between human and pre-human realms that fuels their enduring popularity and pervasive presence in mass culture, with the myriad and diverse expressions in comics, films, TV series, gadgets, plush toys, advertising, fashion. Toy dinosaurs, in particular, forge a poignant link between the earliest life forms on Earth and human infancy: dinosaurs represent our remote past that shapes our foreseeable future through the formation of fantastical imaginations.

Within the dialogue among the exhibiting artists, dinosaurs serve as a meta-theme for generational comparison; those who have been collaborating with street art galleries and post-graffiti scene for ten, twenty or thirty years. Interpretations of meanings have multiplied so much that they cannot be confined inside the walls of Street Levels Gallery. In fact, from the beginning of this project, the author’s dinosaurs overflowed into posters, stencils, and graffiti that spontaneously appeared on the streets, as well as in the publication of a fanzine produced by the Florentine independent publisher Three Faces. Dinosaurs can take on an ironic metaphor for the old as in Hogre’s oil painting Padrinosaurus, echoing the iconic Duke of Urbino painted by Piero della Francesca. That’s also true for Lisa Gelli’s “Andreottiani sauri”. They become elements of political satire, as in the nationalist far-right dinosaur created by Illustre Feccia. They embody the playful element of a coming-of-age tale in Pax Paloscia’s painting or the monstrous reflections of alterity, mirroring human’s nature, as in Gio Pistone’s work. They can express a primitive subversive force inscribed in a non-conforming body in Doublewhy’s portrait of a sex worker dinosaur. And again, In DEM’s work Bone wars, inspired by real events, dinosaurs bear witness to the absurd war between success-thirsty archaeologists. Every birth is a death sentence, yet the drama we perceive in the lack of a higher sense reveals itself in all its candor in Hitnes’ water-color painting.

Art serves as a timeless dialogue that transcends the present moment. Every great representation tells of its era by uniting in the same discourse the works that preceded it with those that will follow. The more a painting looks to its past, the more it expresses the need to outlive its author. Dinosauria is a collective exhibition that reflects on the fundamentally derivative functions of visual arts, connecting authors of different ages and experiences within the same frame.

Overall, the exhibition invites viewers to contemplate the contradictions of contemporary life, like the folly of prioritizing technological progress over the welfare of society as a whole. In a world where the owners of Artificial Intelligences threaten to commodify creativity and deprive users from the joy of creation, the collective show Dinosauria perpetuates the grand game of art, responding with a playful twist. One of the artist in the exhibition aptly put it: “As long as AIs don’t know how to cook potatoes, I’ll continue eating from the Rotisserie!” (Dottor Pira).