Stefanie Krome

I put on value in a kind of aesthetics which feeds itself from a teamwork of concept, archetypical pattern and personal relation to the creation. I try to be less guided towards external impressions then to win as more an essence from the totality of the impressions. It is an almost intimate respect between myself, the material and the thought, which can be ironic, very specifically or sometimes even just a feeling which has to be expressed. The thus originating is a part of the creation process, it was generated, born and has grown and not as a ready, nice, artificial object rapt away from the becoming. And as such it can release in the best case an interpretation process in the viewer. I see myself as an artist in the responsibility to reflect my environment, to process topical events and to make them conceivable; always in research of the new influences which should flow into my work and return something to the world. In the best case to indicate solutions, to make visible the hidden and to work out an essence from a variety of stylistic devices.

Stefanie is a founder and president of the FAC Fronteacciaiocromato Art Association in Carrara, Italy.

POST-PUNK CULTURE but also pop culture, a constructive and active rebellion against the contemporary art system, a small workshop in the center of Carrara where works are created with the most varied expressive techniques (sculpture, painting, screen printing, installations): these are the elements that make the chrome steel front Live (F.A.C.), An artistic group born in 2015 in the city of marbles, founded by the Germans Stefanie Krome and Dominik Stahlberg, to which the Chinese Erika Gao has recently added. THE ACTIVITY OF KROME, STAHLBERG AND GAO, moreover, is frenetic: in the circuits of independent art, their names are known. Stahlberg is a member of NO!art, anti-art movement, avantgarde and internationalist, born in NEOR Krome is the coordinator for Italy of Sculpture net. Both grew up in the German post-Punk culture of the Nineties, and studied sculpture. Krome has been in Italy since 2005 (so much so that it is now called “Italian by choice”): he studied at the Academy of Fine Arts in Carrara and at the University of Leipzig, and has participated in numerous sculpture symposia all over the world, from Italy to Mexico, from Scotland to China, from Greece to Thailand. Studies at the Academy of Fine Arts in Carrara also for Stahlberg and Gao: sculpture for the first, graphic design for the second. For Stefanie and Dominik, the decision to leave Germany and settle in Carrara was not only an artistic decision, but above all a life decision. We have been here for twelve years and feel like we are really from Carrara," say the two, "we live in Castelpoggio and feel at home just seeing the outline of the Sagro. We came here because Carrara is considered a Mecca for sculptors around the world, a place you have to visit at least once in your life. Over the years, the town has certainly become less international; there used to be more artists of many different nationalities, but we persevere. From our point of view, the old town is like a magnificent amusement park, much too quiet. Things are changing here: commerce and crafts are giving way to art workshops. We want to make our contribution and would like to organize some events soon in dialogue with the city to inform people about our work. Stefanie Krome explains, they fell in love with the city and its atmosphere to the point of deciding to stop under the Apuan Alps. The Cruxials dedicated to the characters of the city, a sort of “three-dimensional Encyclopedia of Carrara”, as they define it, also manifests the desire to take root solid roots in a community known for being historically very closed to newcomers (for centuries it has been so: it is no coincidence that in Carrara, even with all the marble available, a real local art school was born only in the eighteenth century), and in a city that years ago, after carving out a prominent space in the art world, had a much more pronounced international vocation, and that has been lost over time.

( FAC FRONTEACCIAIOCROMATO : Dott.ssa Stefanie Krome. Dott.ssa Yuanjun Gao ,Dominik Stahlberg )