The movement was born on May 26, 2016 from an idea of Luigi Profeta, who after about a year of studies and preparations, decides to come out and present his movement with the name of Psycho Avant-garde. The manifesto of the movement is made up of 11 articles, some of which were composed, written and created with the help of the artist Bruno Cavestro. The idea of creating this new movement was born during long meditative walks in the Lombard Alps and Prealps, where the artist Luigi Profeta loves to spend long periods in absolute solitude, with the inseparable notebook on which he sketches sketches and where he fixes feelings and writes. phrases that will then also be used to create his works.

The prerogative of the movement is to involve all the figurative, literary and musical arts having as its horizon that of a reasoned, meditated and never banal art, where aesthetic randomness is abhorred; an art that represents the experience of men and finds a collective conscience, which is the foundation and reason for union between people and peoples. We are a movement of aggregation and, tired of witnessing the sale of vulgarity and low-level, offensive works, we want to resume the clean and cathartic meaning that art in all its forms is able to give. Our proposal is to create a pure art, the daughter of a dialogue between conscious and unconscious, of a long and sincere meditation, where our experiences are shared with those who observe our works and recognize themselves in them.

We are tired of being associated with speculators who have nothing to do with art: our movement wants to impose itself respecting the cosmos and human nature and respecting the primary and fundamental civil rules. Art no longer as an affirmation of oneself, but as the emergence of beauty, an emotional wave that abides in the human soul.

The human brain by its instinctive and automatic nature has a tendency to find ordered structures and familiar shapes in disordered images; the association manifests itself especially towards human figures and faces. Classic examples are the vision of animals or human faces in the clouds; or the ease with which we recognize faces that express emotions in extremely stylized signs, such as emoticons, or in everyday objects such as sinks, cars or appliances. It is believed that this trend, which is a particular case of apophenia, has been favored by evolution, since it allows to identify dangerous situations even in the presence of few clues, for example by being able to spot a camouflaged predator.

Pareidolia (this is the name of the tendency to see images even where they are not there) often allows a rational explanation to be given to apparently paranormal phenomena such as the appearance of images on walls, the appearance of "ghosts" on photographs or abstract works and / or informal. our movement tends to exclude works and works that randomly generate these images.

Obviously we cannot avoid, nor do we want it, that the viewer and the user of the work see something other than what the artist has set out to tell. In any case, the image that the user of the work can imagine or believe he sees is the result of his personal experience. We do not want to produce works where it is chance that creates images or sensations. Our works are the result of meditation and reasoning to tell a state of mind, a sensation, a feeling in a completely conscious way. The difficulty lies precisely here, in being able to completely detach ourselves from the automatic and instinctive influences of our thinking or, better, in recognizing them and putting them aside for an instant, a minute, an hour, until the work we are creating completed. It is a very difficult process to face and carry out and only with meditation and absolute isolation can you manage to control it, even if for a short time, every time you try.

This is also the reason why we move away from speed, to ride the slowness that allows us to think in a calm and free way. Obviously, although we abhor speed, a work can be completed in a few minutes, precisely because it is the result of a long meditation and a long inner dialogue in rigorous solitude. At first it may seem difficult, and in fact it is, but, with time and experience, we can work by dialoguing between the conscious and the unconscious in such a liberating way that dialogue with ourselves becomes a pleasure that is difficult to do. less. The movement simply wants to take a step forward and regain control of thought, which we would like (it would be desirable) to happen in all human and social manifestations.

We are talking about poetics, a concept that cannot be combined with literature alone, in particular with poetry. In reality, poetics concerns all artistic modalities and refers to the expressive intentions of the author. For our movement, poetics are inseparable from the work itself and in practice it is the answer to the question that the viewer asks: “What is the meaning of this work? What does it convey? What do you want to tell? ". It is an aspect that, together with the technique and the subject, completes the understanding of the work. The poetics, however, is not a secret code hidden inside the work, it is rather the essence of the message that the creator of the work has set out to give it.

Our symbol, a labyrinth, has been used since ancient times to purify the mind. But it also represents a stylized brain. About three years ago, I came across a paper released by the Ligurian association for the development of archaeo-astronomical studies (ALSSA), where the discussion on the origins of the labyrinth was deepened. I saw the logo I used on this publication and it reproduced the image of a coin found in Knossos on the island of Crete. Obviously, I started studying and researching the various labyrinths found in the world at all latitudes and that's how I came across the labyrinth of the Halebid temple in Mysore in India. The thing that struck me most, besides the great resemblance to the labyrinth imprinted on the Cretan coin, is that the Indian one is called "The labyrinth of souls". Therefore "the world is a labyrinth where the soul must wander until its liberation". The incredible thing is that, for some time now, my paintings represent the soul in an abstract way. It could not be just a coincidence, but rather the result of a personal research that I had been carrying out for some years.

The labyrinth is a symbol that recurs with enormous frequency in the history of humanity. It is present in many cultures, in the most disparate myths and legends, but also in art, psychology and anthropology. Its main characteristics are to be found above all in the total lack of space-time coordinates, because its meanings seem to be valid beyond geographical limits and remain intact over the centuries. The explanation for the fact that a myth can recur similarly in different countries and different centuries and cultures, changing in form but not in substance, has led me to consider the labyrinth as our trademark and identifying symbol of the Psycho Avant-garde movement.

The labyrinth can be the subject of numerous interpretations, all of which are valid and consistent. It is therefore a very important archetype in human history and that of Crete is only the most famous of a series of labyrinths that have always accompanied man in his evolution. Tantric art sees the mental aspect of the spirit in the labyrinth. Ancient Egypt, on the other hand, reflected the structure of the universe. American Indians think it is the passage from which their ancestors emerged and entered the world. In India it is a form of good luck. Medieval man thought it represented the way of a pilgrimage. In China, the labyrinth has a defensive function against the assaults of evil. The symbol of the labyrinth, therefore, is polysemic; like myth, it is almost a constellation of meanings. The image of the labyrinth immediately refers to an intricate and difficult path to overcome, but it can also take on a particular charm if it is intended as a challenge to human intelligence that tests itself in trying to find a way out. . In more recent times it has been thought that entering a labyrinth purifies the spirit and the soul, leaving it enriched with a spiritual knowledge of oneself. I slightly modified the labyrinth that I used as a symbol of movement with the sole purpose of personalizing it: it looks a bit like a stylized brain, precisely because we understand art as a purifier of the soul and body and the bearer of intellectual enrichment.

The eleven articles of the manifesto summarize the idea and the project of the movement, leaving room for extensions and additions:

Articles 1 and 2 describe the nature and purpose of the movement, that of creating a fertile ground for the growth and development of creative thinking that has sprung from artists from all the arts, but moving in a common direction. Art as we understand it stimulates minds, promotes a peaceful and collaborative attitude between individuals and peoples, strengthens a healthy and clear morality.

Article 3 shows us the way forward in order to realize these ideas: not to lend oneself to commodification projects, to refrain from creating works for the sole purpose of profit or to scandalize public opinion. On the contrary, we take on the responsibility of an authentic witness, of an art that is a constructive critical conscience towards today's society, to rediscover lost values and qualities, in the perspective of a world that aims at peace, mutual support and union of peoples.

Article 4 describes the way in which we intend to create and make art: our source of inspiration is first and foremost the research in ourselves, containers of an experience that, when told, can meet and dialogue with the experience of those who are spectators and users of our research and our work, our thinking. Meditation and creative isolation are of vital importance to us, as they allow for a freer expression of ourselves. We try not to contaminate our works with the fashions and ideas of the moment, but rather to rediscover that inner self that is the architect of our life, of our thought, of our way of making art.

Article 5 helps us to better understand what we intend to express through painting, photography, poetry, music and all the arts that intend to work in this sense. Experimentation should be understood as the study and project of a broader thought that takes the form of a continuous and incessant creative activity, first of all planning, to then arrive at the final act of the finished work. Our work is by its nature extraneous to chance, to production as an end in itself, precisely because research, experimentation and mental processing do not allow this practice. The aesthetic result in our work is certainly important, but it is not the only goal we set ourselves.

In article 6 there is our creed, our thinking and our philosophy of life. Today's society has almost completely lost the values on which the relationships between friends, family, work are based, in exchange for fame and wealth. Today, it seems that the ultimate goal of a life is success at all costs, at the expense of family, children, friendship. It is a desperate search for wealth in the form of money and objects for which it seems that the only purpose of existence is the acquisition and ostentation of "Status Symbol"; while the true values are the family, psycho-physical well-being, culture, respect for the ideas of others, coexistence between peoples and the safeguarding of the world, nature and all the diversities it contains. Hence the need for cultural growth that leads us to reach a higher moral and cultural level. We don't want to trade this for fame and money.

Article 7 is the most "spiritual" and simply expresses the desire to be oneself without external influences. Research and inner dialogue between conscious and unconscious are the way to a better knowledge of oneself and therefore to a better understanding of man and the nuances of his spirit.

Article 8 aims to give a strong and decisive imprint to the movement. The artist, taking the reins of his own thought, expresses and declares it in a strong and unmistakable way, so that speculators and parasites of art can do nothing but take note of his work and his research. The title and the poetics given to the created work are the only way to understand our work and our research. Therefore the author assumes responsibility with his own conscience for what he declares and even if he accepts any form of criticism, as long as it is constructive, leaving the user of the work the possibility of "seeing" other than what he has set for himself, such as artist remains on his own idea because this is the result of a personal and unique inner research.

Article 9 is a recognition of the art of the past: we are proud heirs of all the artists who preceded us, especially those who were recognized only after their death. The art of the past is our history and our culture, but we are children of our time and we express it with current techniques and knowledge, the result of experiments and elaborations of artists who have worked their entire life in an attempt to express a new and recognizable art, even if the goal has not always been achieved. We take the baton bequeathed to us and carry it towards the future with our personal elaboration, to leave a recognizable and decisive mark of our passage, expressing ourselves in such a way as to redeem some fringes that have done nothing but denigrate the art of the past with irreverent works, with the sole purpose of making people talk about themselves, without carrying forward any message: the exact opposite of our thinking and our movement.

Article 10 is a reinforcement and guidance to Article 9.

Article 11 is a message to all those artists who in the future will want to be part of the Psycho Avant-garde movement so that they can collaborate with us in order to build together a project aimed at "uniting" our thoughts to reach a higher cultural level, in a direction that leads the movement to achieve a sincere and honest emotional growth: where the "union" of thought is aimed at enriching us artists and not at conforming us, leaving everyone the freedom to bring their own experience in compliance with the principles of the movement. @Luigi Prophet