Mare Nostra: Q & A with Andrea Limauro

Andrea is an artist and city planner born in Rome, Italy and based in Silver Spring, MD, just outside Washington, DC. Andrea’s work explores issues of migration and identity, the fleeting concepts of home and safety, nationalistic narratives, and gun violence in the US. His work has been exhibited in galleries throughout the DC metropolitan region including IA&A at Hillyer, Touchstone Gallery, the Annapolis Maritime Museum, and the Arlington Art Center. His paintings have been featured in publications in the US, UK, and Italy. Andrea is a Board Member of the non-profit art advocacy Washington Project for the Arts.

andrealimauro.com

My life experience is central to my understanding of “home.” My first experience with migration started early when I was 11 and my family moved to Belgium. I was in middle school – a terrible age for anything, let alone moving to a country where you do not speak the language. In Belgium I was faced with intense discrimination by some teachers. The south of Belgium had experienced mass migration from Italy a few decades earlier and anti-Italian sentiment was still very strong among some people when we arrived there in the 1980′s. I had a physics professor who would call me names – like dirty or stinky Italian – in front of my Belgian classmates and kick me out of the class for no apparent reason other than my background. My parents did not speak French, so I often helped them with grocery shopping and communication in public. I remember this one time when my mom sent me to a bakery while she and my father waited outside in their car. When I was inside the owner refused to sell me bread because of my accent. I was very upset and could not believe someone would act like that towards a child. When I went back to the car I told my parents that there was no bread left, rather than let them know about the episode for fear that my father would confront the baker. My experience in Belgium was very formative for the way I came to understand identity and discrimination. The cruel irony is that when we finally moved back to Italy we relocated to the north of the country where my southern Italian accent often got me singled out or excluded in high school and sports, teaching me yet another lesson about home and identity. I think that was the turning point for me was where I came to conclude that “home” for me would be a fluid concept, or something I had and could build in a place of my choice. It was kind of liberating and since then I have lived over half of my life outside my native country, and in half a dozen countries on three continents. Today, home is where I have my deepest sentimental relationships: Verona and Washington, DC.

Tell us about the inspiration and evolution of this series. What discussions do you hope for Mare Nostrvm to evoke?

Politically, the inspiration for “Mare Nostrvm” started as a reaction to all my current and past “homes” being affected by the global populist movement. It started with Brexit which affected me deeply as it would preclude me today, or my children in the future, to have the same wonderful experience I had in the 1990′s when I lived in England as a student. After that, Trump’s electoral victory on an anti-immigrant wave made me feel very unsafe in the US and forced my wife and I to have serious conversations about relocating. The final straw was the election of a right-wing populist government in Italy fueled mostly by anti-immigrant sentiments.

Artistically, while the political world around me seemed to go crazy, I could not stop thinking about the powerful images of women, children, and men packed on rickety boats trying to get to Italy. I was inspired by their bravery and desperation, leading them to make such a dangerous trip (the deadliest migration route in the world). I felt I wanted to do something about their humanity which often gets lost when right-wing politicians talk about them only focusing on the economic cost of hosting them, or worse, talk about them as being dangerous invaders. The geographic route of their migration and the language politicians use to describe it brought up a lot of parallels with Roman and Italian history. I started researching in more depth the Punic Wars and Italian colonial history to find inspiration for my series. I really started seeing everything as part of this 2000 years of history that links Italy with north Africa and the rest of the Mediterranean. Italy is very much the product of cyclical exchanges with our neighbors on the sea as much as our European neighbors to the north.

Your color palettes and materials are bright, and elicit a sense of happiness at first viewing—there are vibrant hues and a shimmering use of gold—can you tell us more about your use of color, especially in depicting such difficult topics?

I like to make art that is aesthetically pleasing, and the sea is my element. I love how beautiful the Mediterranean is, but also how it can make you feel small and how you must respect its power. I needed to make the sea beautiful and menacing at the same time. Therefore, the color choices are very intentional. The sea in all its depth is dark and grey whereas only its visible top layer shines with enticing and deceiving colors. I also wanted to use colors that connected the series to the story and aesthetics of ancient Rome. From the patterns of cobblestone streets, to the gold leaves, to the reds and greens of Romano frescoes, it all comes back to my youth growing up in the “Eternal City.”

What do you feel will be the next step for this series of work?

I would love to expand the series and the sculptural aspect of “Mare Nostrvm” and find ways to bring it to Italy and Europe as I feel it needs to be seen there. The reception in Washington has been fantastic with great reviews in the Washington Post and the Washington City Paper, however, the theme of “Mare Nostrvm” is perhaps too far removed from the US, even though there are clear parallels with the migration debate in this country.