“REALE VIRTUALE” is the title of the first of a series of exhibitions of the Gagliardi Collection. It is borrowed from a work by Piero Fogliati, an artist from Turin whose research can be said to have influenced the progressive formation of the Gagliardi collection. Most works in the collection were purchased or produced as part of the activities of the GAS (Gagliardi Art System) gallery since 2003 – with a few rare exceptions of works collected since 1968, when Pietro Gagliardi was immersed in the advertising industry-. In 2003, at the first exhibition of the gallery, a solo show by Ennio Bertrand, Pietro Gagliardi met Piero Fogliati and, conversing with him, Pietro’s curiosity for form, substance, narration, digital technology – all elements borrowed from advertising – was joined by his passion for the fantastic, which must have moved Fogliati to abandon his palette and use a lathe to create what would otherwise have been impossible.

Nothing to do with Harry Potter, of course. Fantastic in the sense of everything that the human mind can imagine and strives to transfer into machines or to fix into sculptures. Fantastic in the sense that you can use the virtual to give form and consistency to a vision or utopia. Fantastic because with the instruments of deception, with light, with videos, with an excellent manual skill, you can give life to works that go beyond reality. Can we therefore define certain works as hyperrealistic? It would seem a cold, reductive definition, devoid of the content of surprise and without the inspiration of poetry that characterizes many of the works that have gradually entered the collection.

And without the trick to which the artist often tends, taking the viewer by the hand – it is realy a play in some cases – dragging him at will in a vortex of sensations even disconcerting: “is it real sculpture?” “are they real performers?” “is it real rubber?” “is it a real tsunami?” “are this works stolen from a museum of natural history?”. The answer is indifferently yes or no, by now you have entered the game and you can wrap yourself in the spiral that unfolds around two magical words: REAL and VIRTUAL. Enjoy.