Major Exhibition of Video-Animation, Painting, and Sculpture by Federico Solmi at Conner Contemporary

WASHINGTON, DC.- Conner Contemporary Art presents “Douche Bag City”, a major exhibition of video-animation, painting, and sculpture by Federico Solmi.

Solmi shocked Europe last year by exhibiting “The Evil Empire” (2008), the video portrait of a future Pope whose violent sex addiction leads to widespread ruin. Because of the work’s controversial content, the video was censored in France and Spain. Solmi, who lives in New York, was put on trial in his native Italy for obscenity, blasphemy and offense to religion. Later that year, the Guggenheim Foundation honored Solmi by awarding him with the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Fellowship, in the category of video and audio, and commissioned work from him. This year, curators Sarah Lewis and Daniel Belasco selected Solmi’s latest video, “Douche Bag City” (2010) for exhibition in the SITE Santa Fe Eighth International Exhibition. 

In “Douche Bag City,” Solmi turns his satirical lens toward Wall Street. Here, the artist applies his signature style, combining painting and hand-drawn animation with digital models, through the implementation of computer gaming engines. Solmi’s satire of Wall Street greed and corruption operates as a critique of the violence inherent in social and economic power structures. The artist has designed a special installation of custom-framed LCD screens for the presentation of “Douche Bag City” in the gallery. In addition to Solmi’s most recent videos, we will present his seminal works “Rocco Never Dies” (2005), “The Giant” (2005), and “King Kong and the End of the World” (2006). 

The gallery is also delighted to show Solmi’s newest works, which have never before been exhibited: a large-scale sculpture inspired by “The Evil Empire” and paintings for the video animation “Chinese Democracy and the Last Day on Earth” (a work in progress). 

“Douche Bag City” video installation created in collaboration with 3D artists Russell Lowe (Senior Lecturer at the University of New South Wales, Australia) and Lee Gibson (Senior Lecturer in Industrial Design at Victoria University of Wellington). 

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