The Red Ribbon of Life

Demonstration for Peace

A symbolic action in participatory art with hundreds of citizens working for peace

A cotton Red Ribbon 180 m long and 2 m wide

Potenza, Basilicata, Saturday 29 March 2003, in collaboration with the Department of Culture and Peace of the Municipality of Potenza, the organisations of the Peace Table, Franco Vomero, the city’s young people, the citizens…

The urgency of putting into practice the values connected with Life was proposed and highlighted through the Red Ribbon already unfurled on Etna in 1999 to symbolise the Awakening of dormant Vital Energy and the need for transformation within the continuity of life.

The Red Ribbon, ever more steeped in that original energy, communicates important messages immediately, as a powerful archetypal symbol.

It is at once perceived as a Symbol of Life, first of all for its colour, red, which recalls the blood flowing in the bodies of living beings, and so reminds us of the value of, and respect for, every existence – which war obviously opposes.

The Red Ribbon delivered its message flowing through the city streets, carried by hand by hundreds of people, like an unstoppable river expressing, asking for, demanding attention to the values it carries – which at this moment demand an end to the conflict and the solution of the problems linked to it by other means, mindful of the need for justice, security and freedom for all peoples. The Red Ribbon is a powerful archetypal symbol that should make words superfluous, above all in the face of events of extreme gravity such as war…

The demonstration

began at 4.30 pm in Piazza Bologna; the procession went along via Milano, ponte Di Giura, via Lazio and via Pretoria, arriving in Piazza Prefettura.

Not even the rain and cold could stop the enthusiastic participation of the people, especially the youngest: the long purple serpent climbed the streets, commanding the attention of a city usually cold and not very participatory.

During the procession, leaflets were handed out suggesting to distracted or puzzled onlookers the meaning of that long strip, which had – and wanted to have – no party-political connotations, since it transcended them all to express a higher, universal meaning, relating to the values of Life and Peace.

The Red Ribbon, one of the artist’s earliest stylistic signatures, is a powerful builder of symbols, which it draws preferably on a large scale, above all in nature: the Purple Serpent on Etna, the Web in several places starting from Basilicata, the Labyrinth, the Iron Heart, the Spiral of Rebirth, the Golden Mandala, etc.

On this occasion, with a strong and widely shared action of Urban Art and Participatory Art, it aimed:

…to make public opinion aware of the gravity of the situation war puts us in;

…to prompt reflection on the need to avoid indifference, apathy, selfishness…

…not to stay focused only on the small sphere of our daily lives, when a sense of wider connection is ever more necessary.

The imposing scale of the Work favours visibility and, through wonder, focuses attention and prompts a search for the meanings it carries.

So the emphasis on the communicative medium – born not of the artist’s narcissism but of deeper needs, not answering sensationalism for its own sake but an authentic feeling – becomes a privileged vehicle for living stimuli, indispensable for changing the automatic attitudes of each of us.

The Red Ribbon, a powerful archetypal symbol, transmitter of messages, emotions and demands: it is itself The Message.