AAIE exhibition Forma Fluens May 15 – June 10, 2026 curated by Valeria Contarino Forma Fluens curated by Valeria Contarino Opening: May 15, 2026, 6:00 PM Date: May 15 – June 10, 2026 Venue: AAIE Center for Contemporary Art Via Sermide 7, 00182 Rome ________________________________________ Summary Forma Fluens is a group exhibition bringing together artists active in Rome, Turin, and Tuscany. The exhibition explores the concept of metamorphosis and change, exploring its biological, symbolic, and imaginative aspects. ________________________________________ Change is an inevitable process. Everything transforms and mutates tirelessly, in a continuous and endless movement. Reflections on metamorphosis have permeated the history of Western thought for centuries: from the classical narratives of Ovid, in which change is seen as the ordering principle of the cosmos and the destiny of humanity, to the modern visions of Franz Kafka, where transformation becomes a symbol of alienation and fractured identity. Forma Fluens, curated by Valeria Contarino, is an analytical and reflective investigation of the concept of metamorphosis. Observing the world implies recognizing its fluid and unstable nature, marked by a constant state of becoming. The works on display explore change across multiple levels: biological and natural, symbolic and cultural, and even mythopoetic and imaginative. The exhibition brings together artists who live and work between Turin, Rome, and Tuscany, presenting a plurality of perspectives on transformation as a shared and transversal principle. Cristiano Carotti approaches metamorphosis as a radical transition between life and death. Through a practice reminiscent of ritual, she creates animal sculptures marked by destruction and transfigured into silvery totems, where organic fragility is transformed into a solemn and enduring form. Pamela Pintus investigates the aquatic element through underwater drawing, relying on fluidity and chance to generate visual traces on stone paper, where the gesture becomes a balance between body and environment. Mattia Cleri Polidori explores the processes of morphogenesis, revealing the autonomous organization of matter and demonstrating how natural forms emerge from complex systems, suspended between order and chaos. Marco Mandorlini constructs a dialogue between humans and nature through the superimposition of images and organic materials, dissolving the biological boundary and suggesting a continuity between body and landscape. Huang Yibai develops a layered painting in which metamorphosis manifests itself as the transformation and disintegration of identity, in a dimension suspended between vision and disquiet. Chiara Ressetta constructs timeless environments in which figures emerge and dissolve, inhabiting a liminal space between presence and absence. Jonathan Soliman Awadalla reflects on the precariousness of the present and the instability of contemporary territories, interpreting change as a fragile and constantly redefined condition. The exhibition invites us to consider metamorphosis as a cognitive as well as an ontological condition: every transformation simultaneously involves loss and generation, dissolution and creation. ________________________________________ Artists Jonathan Soliman Awadalla (Fiesole, 1995) lives and works in Florence. He trained in film and visual arts at the ESRA International Film School in Paris and the Academies of Fine Arts in Florence and Bologna. He works with painting, photography, video, and installation, tools used to investigate and deconstruct recent memory. His practice questions the nature of images and their role in shaping personal and collective narratives, with a particular focus on how visual symbols contribute to defining cultural identity. Recent exhibitions include: Something Else (Bayt Al Sinnary, Cairo, 2026), Come chi si abitua alla notte (Crypt of the Church of Santa Lucia, Ferentino, 2025), Cambiamento è Resistenza (La Portineria, Florence, 2022), and the two-person exhibition Enduring Freedom (Volterra + RFK House, Florence, 2022-23). He is a member of the Florentine cultural association Eterotopie and participates in the management of the Spazio Marameo exhibition project. In 2026, he was selected as a finalist in the Artefici del nostro tempo competition, promoted by the City of Venice, as part of the 61st Venice Art Biennale. Cristiano Carotti (Terni, 1981) lives and works in Rome, where since 2020 he has been a member of the artistic collective and artist-run space Post Ex. Moving between painting, sculpture, installation, and video, Carotti explores social dynamics through the study of the archetypal power of symbols. His research investigates the dichotomy between Homo Naturalis and Homo Mechanicus through a practice that turns its gaze toward Nature and the potential for humanity to reestablish an active role within it. The artist adopts an alchemical approach to explore, from an unconventional perspective, the processes of decentralization inherent in universal and human ecosystems. His work has been presented in numerous institutional and non-profit institutions, both nationally and internationally, including: Palazzo Collicola, Spoleto; Spinnerai Contemporary Art Center, Leipzig; Palazzo Riso, Palermo; Fondazione Mannajiuolo, Naples; Cineteca Internazionale, Bologna; Baptistery of the Cathedral of Pietrasanta (LU); Embassy of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan; Italian Embassy to the Holy See; FAO Rome; Kommagene Biennial, Kâhta Adıyaman, Turkey; Galleria Nazionale Arte Moderna, Rome; Museo C.a.o.s., Terni; MARec San Severino Marche (MC); Crea – Cantieri Culturali del Contemporaneo (Venice). His sculptures are part of the permanent collections of Museo M.A.C.I.S.T. Biella, Museo C.a.o.s. Terni, Mole Vanvitelliana Ancona, Parco della Serpara, Paul Wiedmer Sculpture Garden, Civitella d’Agliano. His works have been exhibited in numerous solo and group shows, in collaboration with Italian and international art galleries, including White Noise Gallery (Rome), 1/9 Unosunove (Rome), Art in Space (Dubai), Al Blu di Prussia (Naples), Sconci Gallery (Dubai), and Miomao (Perugia). Since 2022, he has shared the artistic direction of the Godai Fest international festival of music, theater, visual and performing arts, held in Milan at the Parco Ex Paolo Pini, together with multi-instrumentalist Rodrigo D’Erasmo and music producer Daniele Tortora. Mattia Cleri Polidori (Rome, 1987) lives and works in Rome. She graduated from the Academy of Fine Arts in Rome in 2015 and from Wimbledon College of Arts in London in 2016. Since December 2024, he has been a doctoral student at the Academy of Fine Arts in Rome. he is one of the founders of the artist-run space Rione Placido, which opened in January 2023 in Rome. Marco Mandorlini (Pontedera, Pisa, 1998) lives and works in Tuscany. He trained at the Academy of Fine Arts in Bologna in the Visual Arts department. His research investigates the historical and cultural aspects that narrate a place through an ideological and stereotypical vision. Interested in the rural world and folkloristic practices, he creates installations, sculptures, and photographs in which he reworks object-finds that, in their identity and form, evoke a landscape. He has exhibited at Galleria Studio G7, Bologna (2025) and Torrso, Pesaro (2024). he also won the Zucchelli Foundation Talent Award (2024) and the Combat Prize in the graphics section (2023). he participated in the Nuovo Forno del Pane residency project, San Marino di Bentivoglio at Villa Smeraldi - Museum of Rural Civilization (2024), and Falia, municipality of Lozio (2023). Pamela Pintus (Rome, 1981) lives and works in Rome. She is a visual artist and professor of graphic and painting disciplines. She studied at the Academy of Fine Arts in Rome, where she graduated with honors in Painting in 2008 and in Visual Arts and Performing Arts in 2011. Interested in analyzing the landscape in its noema, she takes sensory experience and memory as foundational, focusing her work primarily on the forms of the trace that become signs and language in many of her works. Her works range from painting to drawing, from experimentation with sophisticated materials such as handmade paper, to video and installation. She has participated in artistic residencies both in Italy and abroad, and her works have been exhibited in public and private institutions both in Italy and abroad, including the Italian Pavilion at EXPO 2025 in Osaka, Japan; the Yanzi Academy in Shanghai, China; the Site Oud Sint-Jan Museum in Bruges, Belgium; the Verein Berliner Künstler Gallery in Berlin, Germany; the Parque Cultural in Valparaiso, Chile; the Galéria Slovenského Rozhlasu in Bratislava, Slovakia; the IIC in Santiago, Chile; the Museo Opera Duomo in Milan, Italy; the Arsenale in Venice, Italy; the Museo Macro Testaccio in Rome, Italy; and the Chilean Embassy in Rome, Italy. In 2018, she and Lulù Nuti founded the duo LU.PA, an artistic practice that operates primarily through performance and multimedia. Chiara Ressetta (born 1996 in Trieste) lives and works in Turin. She studied at the Academy of Fine Arts in Florence and the Albertina Academy of Fine Arts in Turin. The artist investigates the physical and mental space at the intersection of interior and exterior, between ancient and sacred, contemporary and everyday dimensions. Her settings are configured as passageways, suspended spaces in which different times coexist without hierarchies. In these mental spaces, objects—Etruscan, archaeological, personal memories—share the same condition as domestic furnishings: they are exposed, inactive, removed from use. They thus take on a museum-like function and become as much the protagonists as the figures, enjoying an autonomous presence. She has participated in numerous exhibitions, including in 2024, Punteggiato di luce, sdraiava lì, scintillante, curated by Milena Zanetti at Mimmo Scognamiglio Arte Contemporanea in Milan; Salon Artbite, curated by Nicoletta Rusconi at Palazzo Lombardia in Milan; and Drive me acid, curated by Niccolò Giacomazzi at the Sapienza Museum of Contemporary Art in Rome. In 2023, she took part in Fantasmagorie, curated by Benedetta Monti and organized by Andrea Festa Fine Art. Huang Yibai (b. 2005, Zhejiang) lives and works in Milan. The artist attends the Academy of Fine Arts in Florence. In 2025, he held a solo exhibition at the Pin Gallery in Beijing. In May 2026, she participated in the Beijing Art Week. Valeria Contarino (b. 1997, Rome) is an Italian art historian and curator, trained at La Sapienza University of Rome and the Catholic Institute of Paris. She has curated exhibitions in Italy and abroad, collaborating with galleries and museums. She has also worked as a curatorial assistant at several Italian institutions, including the Museum of Modern Art of the Uffizi Gallery in Florence and the Galleria Spada in Rome. In 2022, she was the director of 193 Gallery in Venice during the 59th Venice Biennale. She subsequently moved to Paris, where she worked for the Beaux Arts publishing house, contributing to the development of art publishing projects in collaboration with major French institutions such as the Centre Pompidou, Villa Medici, and many others. Learn More