In these unexpected, peculiar times, Giusy Amoroso, Creative Director and CGI Artist, and Gino Tremila, Creative Director and AR Artist, visually explore the concept of fear through a multi-faceted collaborative project. Giusy and Gino decided to give fear a body and represent that very sensation through an indefinite, mutable organic form: that’s how PANDEMONE was born. PANDEMONE is an awakening of an ancient feeling that we seem to have forgotten to face – something that’s both indefinite and real, individual and collective. Confronting ideas of unity and distance, the work touches upon ideas of togetherness, expression and human connection now that everything seems to have come to a halt, in those times of shared uncertainty and shifting feelings. With PANDEMONE Giusy and Gino aim to instill a willingness to pause, think about and understand this novel shared experience, ourselves, and the world we live in.

Your collaboration on Pandemone has been a way to explore individual and shared fears in the light of the latest events. However, the work goes beyond the recent awakening of this particular feeling to reflect upon the genesis of fear understood as a concept. Can you speak about how you developed the project?

GIUSY (@marigoldff): I was in Italy visiting my Twin/Best Friend Gino almost 3 weeks ago, and at that time the Corona Virus exploded: first in the north and then spread out through all the country. Fortunately (or not ), I was able to fly back in Berlin but my friends Gino and his girlfriend Gloria escaped in the countryside.

GINO (@tr3mila): We preventively left from the city to avoid Coronavirus lockdowns, reaching a house nearby Perugia, in the center of Italy. After spending a couple days there, I started to notice the rising of really mixed feelings inside me.
On the one hand the media and doctors were talking of an unprecedented pandemic taking over, I was worried for my friends and elder members of my family, afraid of how long the emergency situation might keep on going. I knew at a certain point people wouldn’t be able to stand lockdowns any longer and began to freak out. On the other hand when I realised the whole world was just about to stop for a couple days, it didn’t sound that bad.
The age we’re living in has been spinning way faster than it actually could, lately. We often find ourselves questioning why is humanity behaving like this. Since the lockdown happened many of our friends, even those living in the cities, are trying to spend this suspended time doing something for themselves, for others, or for the planet. It seems like they finally had the time to breathe out for a second, and recall what their real priorities are. Many are getting crazy, but others started to be nicer to each other here.

They say “we are all on the same boat”, I like that. And I literally never felt such a contradictory mood in my entire life. When I told Giusy about the way me and Gloria were feeling, she was totally getting it. That’s the moment we decided to work together on something that could help us express and better understand what we were experiencing, and see if there are others identifying in those shaky negative-positive feelings.

GIUSY: As artists we wanted to give a visual representation to this controversial sensation coming out during such a unique and uncertain time. Exploring the concept of modern pandemic both in its negative and positive aspects, as people are more united in many ways (like me and Gino creating a project and managing to continue to grow it by working together remotely). We decided to give this disease a ‘body’, a real organic mutable shape; and a mask, since it has no identity. It had to be scary, fascinating, wild and inspiring at the same time.

The representation of the creature we have done captures the awakening of an ancient fear of the human race. Undefined feeling of individual and collective fear of this beast that does not stop for anything and walks its way generating discomfort. But also bringing people to a deeper understanding of things as they are all facing the one same issue, able to paralyze our system.We decided to create a Face Filter, A 3D Character, A 3D Artwork Illustration series and the Typography. We approached that through various digital medias (AR, CGI and GRAPHIC DESIGN).

We are currently witnessing an array of ways fear induces people to act – mostly selfishly, sometimes unreasonably, in abrupt or confused pursuits of self-preservation instincts. Being forced to deal with restricted social interactions, to adapt to new boundaries and states of uncertainty, has also brought people to communicate, share and express more online. How do you feel about this aspect of the phenomenon?

G & G: It depends, there are many different ways in which people use Internet and social communication. It’s hard to imagine living in times like this without tools as video chats, it would be even more confusing and hard to stand. We are often video-calling our friends these days and it makes us feel good to hear them and talk, we feel a bit closer and support each other. But internet is also the only way for escaping house walls for many, bringing people to spend excessive amounts of time online scrolling or binge-watching stuff. When it happens to us we feel very dissociated, almost out of ourselves.

Taking into account the different modalities in which interpersonal relations and human contact occur in the digital age, both at this particular time and habitually, why did you create a face filter to engage with the situation we’re experiencing?

GINO: Although there are yet many technical and creative limitations in making AR filters for Instagram, I think of them as great expressive tools whet it comes to getting closer to people’s perception of self. Giving someone the possibility of “wearing” your artwork (or your message) and interacting with it into a real-time AR experience establishes a direct connection with people online: those who used to be simple observers can now have an active role, embodying the artwork itself.

It has to be said that mostly we created this filter for ourselves. In fact we plan to wear it in every social communication until this situation will come to an end. But after developing it we liked it so much we thought it would be better to share it with everyone in the www.

Your work also makes me think about the sense of wonder that the advent of the first 3D computer graphics originally sparked, and to recall how rapidly that feeling dissipated as technology got increasingly advanced – life-like. To me it seems that, throughout the years, that excitement and the initial amazement has been replaced either by uncanny valley-related reactions, disillusionment, or fetishism. Considering contemporary visual culture more broadly, how do you perceive the role of CGI, and of the representations that stem from it?

GIUSY: I perceive this as a ratio between aesthetic of virtuality and perception of reality. What we call real, to me, is nothing else than simple perception, a synergy I have with reality itself.
I often identify my aesthetic as a separation of what is real from reality. A relationship between what is real and virtual, dividing real from reality.
In fact, digital technology promises real transformations in perceptive, cognitive, communicative and aesthetic fields. After all, contemporary art often finds itself exploring new territories, new "realities" and boundaries. In my vision this is spontaneously going into something similar to those ideals Kant once placed at the center of his aesthetic speculation: the reaching of the sublime.

Also, my opinion is that many people using CGI out there sometimes got sort of “stuck” into what we can define as “visual stereotypes” of 3D art. Futuristic cyber bodies and neon lights, cyber-influenced stuff. We all love it, yes, but maybe we had enough. It’s time to focus on something different, something further. Our ideal of future is dramatically changing and the way we represent it is about to change consequently.

I’d like to hear your thoughts about advertising- and marketing-driven artistic production. How are these specific modes affecting the social role of visual arts at large? Do you think the unfamiliarity of the current situation – this break in ordinary patterns of productivity – could contribute to the development of a different awareness in this regard?

GINO: We think nowadays many artists are living in a perpetual creative-stress situation. The market imposes them to constantly produce and improve, always more and more and you know, creativity is like yin and yang, it needs to relax in some moments in order to give more strength in the following one. We are so much into this loop that sometimes it can be hard to understand when the need of making art actually comes from an expressive need rather than market “pressure”.

GIUSY: I think many of us felt so wrong about ourselves when we were asked to create something stunning but were just not in the mood of making stunning things. It feels like we are so busy in running faster and faster that we forgot where do we actually want to go. I believe this forced stop condition will allow many people to have some extra time to think, and my hope is they will use it to achieve a deeper comprehension of themselves and the world we are living in.

What will be the first thing you’ll do when the quarantine period will come to an end?

GIUSY: Maybe a long trip to South America with Gino, connecting with the magic and nature of that area of the world. (ﾐ♡ܫ♡ﾐ)

GINO: We can do anything just please let me go shave at my barber’s place first please lol.