Alberto Porro
Floating Signifiers
April 21 to May 22nd, 2021
Galerie Nicolas Robert is pleased to present the exhibition Floating Signifiers by Alberto Porro, starting April 21, 2021. The exhibition features two paintings from the artist’s current research. The paintings – different in technique, size and formal features - face each other in the space of the Project Room, engaged in a silent conversation. In semiotics, a ‘floating signifier’ – also known as ‘empty signifier’ - refers to a sign that points towards no agreed upon meaning. Just as floating signifiers, these two images are susceptible to multiple interpretations, and function primarily as vehicles for absorbing the meanings which viewers choose to impose on them, rather than emitting their own.
The subjects of Porro’s paintings are biomorphic abstractions that reflect his formal interest in fundamental forms. He depicts objects that are neither socially or economically specific, and are not coming from any knowable sights of material cultural production. Though the subject matter he explores sits outside the realm of recognizable symbolic forms, his work is aesthetically rooted in the history of still life - particularly in the Straight Photography era. He frames his abstract subjects with the same objectivity that one can find in Edward Weston’s photos of vegetables.
Born in Milan, Italy, in 1986, Alberto Porro currently lives and works in Tio’tia:ke/Montreal and is an MFA candidate in Painting and Drawing at Concordia University.
