Marco Fusinato is a contemporary artist and noise-musician whose work takes the form of installation, photographic reproduction, performance, and recording.
As an artist, he conceives his work as a succession of interrelated projects, some of which continue across numerous iterations. Within these projects the works are almost always serial and use specific frameworks for experimentation. As a musician, he explores the idea of noise as music, using the electric guitar and mass amplification to improvise intricate, wide-ranging, and physically affecting frequencies.
Marco Fusinato was selected to represent Australia at the 59th International Art Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia (2022) in which he presented DESASTRES, a 200-day performance as installation. His work has also been presented in many other significant exhibitions including All the World’s Futures, 56th International Art Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia (2015); The Imminence of Poetics, 30th Sao Paulo Biennial (2012) and SUPERPOSITION: Art of Equilibrium and Engagement, 21st Biennale of Sydney (2018). His work was included in Soundings: A Contemporary Score, the first ever exhibition of sound at the Museum of Modern Art, New York (2013). Fusinato performs regularly in the experimental music underground, primarily as a solo artist and has released many recordings on vinyl format. DESASTRES which was first performed in the Australia Pavilion at the Venice Biennale in 2022 has since been performed at Berlin Atonal (2023), Rewire Den Haag (2024), Now or Never Melbourne (2024) & Unsound Krakow (2024). His ongoing series of durational noise-guitar performances Spectral Arrows – described as a monumental aural sculpture – was first performed at The Glasgow International Arts Festival in 2012 and along with his solo performances continue to be performed in galleries, museums, theatres and festivals throughout the world.
SELECTED PROJECTS IN
NO PARTICULAR ORDER
EMAIL: studio@theblackesthole.com
INSTAGRAM: @marcofusinatostudio
INSTAGRAM: @desastres_desastres
GALLERY REPRESENTATION: PALAS Sydney
PERFORMANCE MANAGEMENT & BOOKINGS: Outer Agency Berlin
DESASTRES performance
Improvised slabs of noise, saturated feedback, and discordant intensities with an electric guitar trigger a synchronised deluge of disparate and disconnected images onto a large-scale screen. The images are from an extensive archive that is sourced via an open search across multiple online platforms, or photographs taken with a phone-camera. The sound is improvised and the images randomised.
DESASTRES, 2022
Two hundred day performance as installation, Australia Pavilion
59th International Art Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia, 2022
DESASTRES, 2024
Two day performance on world’s largest volume LED screen (12 x 88 metres). Now or Never Festival, Nant Studios, Melbourne
DESASTRES screen paintings
A series of experimental silkscreen paintings of selected images from the DESASTRES archive. The titles for each painting are the jpg tags of the original image files.
DESASTRES 288631D3-2D44-4EBF
AF461AA1FF176766_source copy.jpg variation, 2024
Liquitex titanium white heavy body acrylic with gloss and screen-print medium on Belle Arti 96U Fine 360gsm black double primed linen. 150 x 240 cm
DESASTRES NQ6U7KH2U5OL5OCOXKRTVI2IWQ-1.jpg variation, 2024
Liquitex titanium white heavy body acrylic with gloss and screen-print medium on Belle Arti 96U Fine 360gsm black double primed linen. 150 x 240 cm
DESASTRES dlce34aza7o1pjlcet7q.jpg variation, 2024
Liquitex titanium white heavy body acrylic with gloss and screen-print medium on Belle Arti 96U Fine 360gsm black double primed linen. 150 x 240 cm
DESASTRES 81238A.jpg variation, 2024
Liquitex titanium white heavy body acrylic with gloss and screen-print medium on Belle Arti 96U Fine 360gsm black double primed linen. 150 x 240 cm
DESASTRES il_fullxfull.3655095447_cb5h_rough-diamond-uncut.jpg variation, 2024
Liquitex titanium white heavy body acrylic with gloss and screen-print medium on Belle Arti 96U Fine 360gsm black double primed linen. 150 x 240 cm
DESASTRES 28%DOT20dpi600px.jpg variation 1, 2024
Liquitex titanium white heavy body acrylic with gloss and screen-print medium on Belle Arti 96U Fine 360gsm black double primed linen. 150 x 240 cm
DESASTRES 27-mazatlan-mexico-had-4875-homicides-per-100000-residents.jpg variation, 2024
Liquitex titanium white heavy body acrylic with gloss and screen-print medium on Belle Arti 96U Fine 360gsm black double primed linen. 150 x 240 cm
DESASTRES 20140827_Kotsende_molenpoes_Woldzigt_Roderwolde_Dr_NL.jpg variation, 2024
Liquitex titanium white heavy body acrylic with gloss and screen-print medium on Belle Arti 96U Fine 360gsm black double primed linen. 150 x 240 cm
DESASTRES Dog_excrement_on_the_street_in_detail.jpg variation, 2024
Liquitex titanium white heavy body acrylic with gloss and screen-print medium on Belle Arti 96U Fine 360gsm black double primed linen. 150 x 240 cm
DESASTRES 28%DOT20dpi600px.jpg variation 2, 2024
Liquitex titanium white heavy body acrylic with gloss and screen-print medium on Belle Arti 96U Fine 360gsm black double primed linen 150 x 240 cm
DESASTRES screen paintings, 2025
Installation view
MASS BLACK
IMPLOSION
A selection of scores by avant-garde composers reproduced at 1:1 scale. A line is ruled from every original note to an arbitrarily chosen point on the score as a proposition for a new composition. The proposition being, every note played at once as a moment of consolidation and singular impact.
A selection from the series below —
Mass Black Implosion
(Agglomeration, Anestis Logothetis), 2007
Ink on archival facsimile of score.
59 × 79 cm
Mass Black Implosion
(Liaisons, Roman Haubenstock-Ramati), 2007
ink on archival facsimile of score.
65 × 87 cm
Mass Black Implosion
(Coordination I-V, Anestis Logothetis) Variation I, 2017
ink on archival facsimile of score.
79 x 92 cm
Mass Black Implosion
(Treatise, Cornelius Cardew), 2013
ink on archival facsimile of score.
part 43 0f 193 parts, each 50.5 × 66.5 cm
Mass Black Implosion
(Treatise, Cornelius Cardew), 2013
ink on archival facsimile of score.
Part 61 of 193 parts, each 50.5 × 66.5 cm
Mass Black Implosion
(Treatise, Cornelius Cardew), 2013
ink on archival facsimile of score.
Part 131 0f 193 parts, each 50.5 × 66.5 cm
Mass Black Implosion
(Treatise, Cornelius Cardew), 2013
ink on archival facsimile of score.
Part 178 of 193 parts, each 50.5 × 66.5 cm
Mass Black Implosion
(Treatise, Cornelius Cardew), 2013
193 parts. Installation view
Mass Black Implosion
(Katarakt, Anestis Logothetis), 2007
ink on archival facsimile of score.
65 × 102 cm
Mass Black Implosion (Water Music, John Cage), 2010
ink on archival facsimile of score.
Part 1 of 3 parts, each 77 × 103 cm
Mass Black Implosion
(Mobile for Shakespeare, Roman Haubenstock-Ramati) Variation 1, 2007
ink on archival facsimile of score.
64 × 85 cm
Mass Black Implosion
(Ludwig van, Mauricio Kagel), 2017
ink on archival facsimile of score.
(detail) 10 parts, each 79.2 x 102.7 cm
Mass Black Implosion
(Ludwig van, Mauricio Kagel), 2017
ink on archival facsimile of score.
(detail) 10 parts, each 79.2 x 102.7 cm
Mass Black Implosion
(Ludwig van, Mauricio Kagel), 2017
ink on archival facsimile of score.
10 parts, each 79.2 x 102.7 cm. Installation view
Mass Black Implosion
(Free music No. 1, Percy Grainger), 2009
ink on archival facsimile of score.
61.5 × 88 cm
Mass Black Implosion
(Black Angels, George Crumb), 2017
ink on archival facsimile of score.
Part 1 of 5, each 74 × 101 cm
Mass Black Implosion
(ST/48-1, 240162, Iannis Xenakis), 2007
ink on archival facsimile of score.
Part 1 of 8 parts, each 75 x 90 cm
Mass Black Implosion
(Algo Para Guitarra, Carlos Cruz de Castro), 2007
ink on archival facsimile of score.
Part 1 of 3 parts, each 78.5 × 98 cm
Mass Black Implosion
(DE KOONING, Morton Feldman), 2012
ink on archival facsimile of score.
2 parts, each 65 × 87 cm
Mass Black Implosion
(Sublimation, Anestis Logothetis), 2017
ink on archival facsimile of score.
64.5 x 89 cm
Mass Black Implosion
(Shaar, Iannis Xenakis), 2012
ink on archival facsimile of score.
Part 1 of 5 parts, each 61.5 × 88 cm
THE INFINITIVES
A series of images from the media of the decisive moment in a riot in which a protagonist brandishes either a rock (Infinitive) or a rock against a backdrop of fire (Double Infinitive). Each image is from a different part of the world from the twenty-first century and is blown up to history-painting scale using the latest commercial print technologies.
The Infinitive 1, 2015
white UV halftone ink on black aluminium
250 x 500 cm
The Infinitive 2, 2015
white UV halftone ink on black aluminium
250 x 750 cm
The Infinitive 3, 2015
white UV halftone ink on black aluminium
250 x 625 cm
The Infinitive 4, 2015
white UV halftone ink on black aluminium
250 x 625 cm
The Infinitive 5, 2015white UV halftone ink on black aluminium
250 x 750 cm
The Infinitive 6, 2019
white UV halftone ink on black aluminium
250 x 500 cm
The Infinitive 7, 2019
white UV halftone ink on black aluminium
250 x 750 cm
Double Infinitive 1, 2009
white UV halftone ink on black aluminium
250 × 250 cm
Double Infinitive 2, 2009
white UV halftone ink on black aluminium
250 × 625 cm
Double Infinitive 3, 2009
white UV halftone ink on black aluminium
250 × 250 cm
Double Infinitive 4, 2009
white UV halftone ink on black aluminium
250 × 500 cm
Double Infinitive 5, 2009
white UV halftone ink on black aluminium
250 × 500 cm
The Infinitives, 2015
Installation view
Double Infinitives, 2009
Installation view
THERE IS NO AUTHORITY
A backdrop by anarchist punk band Crass is made into a wool rug which covers the floor of the gallery, forcing the audience to walk across it. A concealed camera takes an image every time someone steps on the rug and sends it to a monitor at the far end of the gallery. With a delay between capture and display the audience see their own image on top of the large-scale woven text.
THERE IS NO AUTHORITY, 2012
100% wool rug 925 x 1204 cm, monitor, camera. Installation view
FROM THE HORDE TO THE BEE
A book is produced to redistribute funds from the 56th Venice Biennale of Art* to an archive of militant and critical publishing housed in an anarchist squat in Milan. The book features a selection of material from the archive** A4 in size and consisting of 496 B&W pages, the content of anarchist, autonomist and marxist material ranges from the 1960’s up until the time of publishing the book. All the images are reproduced at 1:1 scale exactly as they were positioned on an A4 scanner. At the exhibition, rows of books sit on the perimeter of a large purpose-built table. In exchange for a book the audience throws 10€ into the centre of the table. The cash remains there for the duration of the exhibition. The edition of 10,000 books means a potential of 100,000€ on the table. At the end of the exhibition all the cash on the table is collected by the artist in garbage bags and given to the archive/squat.
*All the World’s Futures, 56th International Art Exhibition, la Biennale di Venezia. 9 May - 22 November 2022, 2015.Curated by Okwui Enwezor. ** Primo Moroni Archive, COX 18, Via Conchetta 18, Milan.
From the Horde to the Bee, 2015496 page A4 book in an edition of 10,000, table, cash, garbage bags. 500 x 500 x 75 cm. Installation view
CONSTELLATIONS
A ceiling-height freestanding wall is built to bisect an empty gallery. One side of the bisecting wall is empty, on the other side a baseball bat is attached to a steel chain which is fixed to the wall. Hidden inside is a series of microphones connected to a PA system. The audience is invited to strike the wall. Unbeknown to the audience is that their actions will be amplified at 120 dB.
Constellations: Singapore, 2015
Baseball bat, chain, purpose-built wall, 300 x 4000 x 150 cm with internal PA at 120 dB. Installation view
Constellations: Sydney, 2018
Baseball bat, chain, purpose-built wall, 600 x 2400 x 150 cm with internal PA at 120 dB. Installation view
AETHERIC PLEXUS
The equipment associated with spectacle, usually employed to highlight a performer, is directed at the gallery audience whose physical presence triggers an intense assault of white light and white noise.
Aetheric Plexus (Broken X), 2013
36,000 watts white light, 120db white noise. Installation view
THIS IS NOT MY WORLD
A selection of graphic designers are employed to create a banner featuring the titular slogan which was originally attached to the side of a government building in Zagreb in a guerrilla action by the dissident Yugoslavian ‘Group of Six’ artists.
THIS IS NOT MY WORLD, 2006-2019
Dupont screenprint on trilobal polyester
5 parts: each 150 x 1800 cm
Left to right: design by Joseph Churchward (2012), design by Experimental Jetset (2010), design by Seldon Hunt (2006), design by Radim Pesko (2018), design by Masahiko Ohno (2019). Installation view.
NOISE & CAPITALISM
A selection of anarchist pamphlets from the twenty first century are first enlarged and then set out as they once would have been laid out on the printing press. The upper left quadrant contains the front and back covers; the upper right, the inside covers; the lower left, all those inside pages that would have been folded facing up, superimposed one upon the other; the lower right, all those that would have been folded facing down, similarly superimposed.
Why she doesn’t give a fuck about your insurrection, 2010
UV and indian ink on Fabriano Artistico 300gsm paper. 232 × 324 cm
Theses on the Imaginary Party, 2010
UV and indian ink on Fabriano Artistico 300gsm paper. 232 × 324 cm
Escapism has its price The artist has his income, 2010
UV and indian ink on Fabriano Artistico 300gsm paper. 232 × 324 cm
The Capitalist System, 2010
UV and indian ink on Fabriano Artistico 300gsm paper. 232 × 324 cm
Bia, 2010
UV and indian ink on Fabriano Artistico 300gsm paper. 232 × 324 cm
Noise & Capitalism, 2010
Installation view
ASHES OF CLOUD
A series of noise-guitar improvisations accompanied by video montage. A new video is made for each performance. The video accompaniment is a selection of clips mostly from the camera pointing at the computer screen. If something in the footage needs editing (removal), black gaffa tape is stuck on the screen to block out that section and the footage is re-shot.
Ashes of Cloud, 2024
Unsound Festival
SPECTRAL ARROWS
Spectral Arrows is an ongoing series of long-duration performances for guitar and mass amplification. In Spectral Arrows, Fusinato arrives at the venue when it opens for business, sets up his equipment facing a wall and proceeds to play for the whole day until the end of business hours. Fusinato presents himself here in the guise of a worker, clocking on and unceremoniously clocking off at the end of his working day, refusing to allow the behind-the-scenes mystery of rehearsals and preparations to lend an aura to the performance, and affirming the deskilled ethos of his work. For the audience, the length of the performance frustrates the expectation of a manageable form, forcing all but the hardiest to content themselves with only a fragment of the whole. Even for those who stick it out, the extended duration destroys the listener’s ability to retain and assess the structure of the performance. Breaking with both the traditional form of the musical performance and, through Fusinato’s resolutely anti-social position facing way from the audience, the standard affective relationship between audience and performer, the sound of Spectral Arrows becomes a monumental aural sculpture, filling the gallery, not with steel or concrete, but with vibrations traveling through air.
RECORDS
Solo Noise-guitar vinyl 12inch LPs. Live and studio recordings. Front cover image from art history, back cover image from the media. All images black & white, full bleed, no text.
Available at
https://www.soundohm.com/artist/marco-fusinato
https://www.naturestrip.com/artists/
Ripping Skies,
2009
Vinyl 12inch LP
No Fun Productions NFP-42 NYC
Ambianxe, 2010
Vinyl 12inch LP
The Spring Press #9 NYC
L’Origine/TEMA, 2013
Vinyl 12inch LP
Bocian Records BC MAF Warsaw
Spectral Arrows: Rotterdam, 2013
Vinyl 12inch LP
De Player DOB 65, Rotterdam
Spectral Arrows: Sydney, 2014
Vinyl 12inch LP
Amplan, Milan
Spectral Arrows: Singapore, 2017
Vinyl 12inch LP
Ujikaji Records, Singapore
Side A
Side B
Spectral Arrows: Venice, 2017
Vinyl 12inch LP
Bocian Records BC MAF 2 Warsaw
Side A
Side B
Spectral Arrows: Auckland, 2019
Vinyl 12inch LP
theblackesthole 001Melbourne
Side A
Side B
Spectral Arrows: Melbourne, 2019
Vinyl 12inch LP
theblackesthole 003 Melbourne
Side A
Side B
Atmosphæram, 2022
Vinyl 12inch LP
theblackesthole 004 Melbourne
WORDS
https://bombmagazine.org/articles/2024/06/14/marco-fusinato-alan-licht/
https://buxtoncontemporary.com/exhibitions/creative-cosmos/
https://artreview.com/nothing-is-universal-not-even-air-marco-fusinato-on-representing-australia-at-the-59th-venice-biennale/
https://www.artforum.com/features/dark-energy-the-art-of-marco-fusinato-196642/