PESO SPECIFICO-What Emerges, What Remains

PESO SPECIFICO begins with this question, examining how objects, images and memories change their ways of existing through displacement, deterioration, transformation and the passage of time. What once appeared intact may become fragmented; what was hidden may become visible again; what seems to have lost its original function may acquire a different meaning.

The exhibition develops along two interconnected directions: EMERGERE and RESTARE — WHAT EMERGES and WHAT REMAINS.

EMERGERE focuses on what has been hidden, displaced or separated from its original context. When it becomes visible again, something once familiar may be observed and interpreted differently. Changes in position, form or context alter the relationship between an object and its viewer. The question is not simply how something is brought back into view, but what happens when it is encountered again under conditions different from those in which it originally existed.

RESTARE shifts attention to what survives change: fractures, worn surfaces, fragments and material traces. These are not defects to be corrected, nor necessarily signs of irreversible loss, but physical evidence of what has taken place. Transformation does not always erase what existed before. It may expose certain elements, make the consequences of change visible or alter their meaning.

The artistic duo Nie Mengxi & Andrea Rizzo and artist Zhang Xingyu approach these two directions from different perspectives. On one side, what was hidden becomes visible again, removed from its original context and open to new interpretations. On the other, remaining traces, alterations and fragments become the focus of attention.

Through different materials, images and forms, their practices question the assumption that the identity of an object depends entirely on its original integrity. Transformation may profoundly alter what we see without necessarily erasing every connection to what it once was.

The exhibition does not seek to reconstruct the past or restore objects to a presumed original condition. Instead, it focuses on the moment when something changes, is displaced, worn away or fragmented, and on how these processes affect our ability to recognize and interpret it.

When integrity is lost, on what grounds do we determine the value of something?