medina zabo (b.1979, arezzo) is an italian interdisciplinary artist based between etruria and london.
former journalist and video reporter (member of the national corporation ordine dei giornalisti) interested mostly in enviromental and social issues, quits in 2012 and decides on pursuing exclusively her art career path. after an early period of self-education, she begins to exhibit in institutional art venues in 2016 just enrolled at the fine arts academy.
2005_ MA in corporate communication at università degli studi di perugia, degree dissertation in semiotics
2010_ undergraduate course in web communication & new media at ied_european institute of design (rome campus)
2015-2019_ BA programmes in painting _ alumna of accademia di belle arti pietro vannucci perugia (awarded with the chen ming merit scholarship); alumna of accademia di belle arti di roma
moved to london in january 2020, at the present commutes between the capital city of england and perugia.
my approach aims to foreground disturbance and faults in different semiotic patterns towards its potential to effect unforeseens, thereby fosters the issue of metamorphosis in nature as a metaphor of social frameworks, by reversing semantic relations between conceptions and materials, beyond human ends and actions.
my mixed background and a six months cohabiting in 2013 with a colony of swarming bees in the then dining room of my house led me to deepen similarities between man and honeybees in social learning; hence to explore and evoke phenomena of colonization in different environments and realms, up to transcode it in a multifaceted art practice.
at the core of my investigation is calcified beeswax from parasited honeycombs, that is colonized by great wax moth (aka galleria mellonella), finally processed in the manner of manmade construction materials eventually recoded according to human aesthetics.
this special kind of bone tissue-like matter gets from dismantled beehives thus it meant to be destroyed, as far as unproductive for human activity. on such a vision, bees construct nests made of cells, moths keep on colonizing them and build a new scenario, endlessly: although our standpoint acknowledges any epiphany from real world by itself, we go furtherly manipulating it to create our candy-coloured simulacrum of nature.
the artistic process seeks to trigger a dialogue between never-ending processes of nature and the serial character of man-made features, mostly focusing thereof on stainless steel and RAL-colours, as well as iconographies and further materials used relate to occurrences and remnants of domestication or change of state. the working methods are those from renaissance oil painting and street art as well, plugged in through various sculpting techniques.
_living with bees.. get a peek
award winning o.r.a prize 2018 for artistic research selected by curva pura+roots
shortlisted finalist at 13th international art prize laguna, land art section
phantasmagoria award winning curators’selection, artrepreneur_arts org. new york
emerging artists testimonial at IAF international author forum 2018
permanent installation, procura della repubblica, palazzo martorelli orsini, spoleto, perugia, 2017, curated by accademia di belle arti di perugia
playing performer for
workshop lemniscate – the art of infinity curated by petia knebel– from augsburg university, sponsored by fine arts academy pietro vannucci, perugia, april 2016
artist residency at beverly pepper’s studio focused on restoring the maquette of ascension (within the exhibiton opera pr1ma off_beverly pepper), sponsored by beverly pepper foundation and aba perugia, todi, january 2017
artist residency at beverly pepper’s studio, setting up the exhibition “beverly pepper tra todi e il mondo” curated by massimo mattioli sponsored by beverly pepper foundation, todi, november 2018
hdemia de rooms, delollis underground collective, rome, october 2018
creative writing&drawing teacher at jobel group, rome, autumn 2018
member artist of the international collective sciame-project
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