Franco Angeloni (IT): Cultural Philanthropist in Disguise

Franco has made acquintance on the Internet with a habitant of Kuopio, Miss X, who knows the ANTI-festival and appreciates the yearly event very much. Moreover, while she does not have a proper idea of why people there organise this international art event, she said that she is thrilled by it and wants somehow to be a part of it. So, Franco asked her to cooperate with him in a project there and she said yes, but on one condition. As she does not want to get directly involved wtih the festival, she is requesting that only her name will be known upon completion of the project and nothing else.

She is a philanthropist and “some kind of an art lover” too, and, though not still very sure, she is considering giving away a reward in money for a flight ticket to Rome. She is doing this in order to find out about a place (which she discovered), where an ancient Finnish inscription – that the Romans stole from the Finns back in the old ages – has been preserved in the Italian capital ever since. He or she, who will unravel the riddle that Franco is designing as his contribution to ANTI-festival 2005, will finally get the chance to see this old inscription in Rome.

For the project Franco will need the participation of a few Kuopio inhabitants and their cars. About 12 people are needed. Cars and their respective owners will be given a colour-letter, (a 55x55cm plastic cut-out or adhesive-pvc) to stick on their car sides and display it for the public to view. Cars and letters will be publicly intercepted as they drive around, in/out of town. The summing up of these letters, that is the right anagram of them, will form the entire name of this temporary Kuopio resident. If it gets solved, the name of this person (philanthropist) will be made in a neon-sign or a cut-out stone and displayed on the stairs at the end of the festival.

Born in Rome, Franco Angeloni studied Art history, graphic design and printing arts at the Pomezia Art Institute (Rome), moving to Amsterdam in 1990. Since then he works and lives both in Rome and Amsterdam. His work has been represented by private galleries and exhibited in public institutions and museums across Europe as well as in the US.