Cruise Missile Project

Celli's installation stands garish and threatening, seeming at first to be an obvious comment on the politics of our time. Considered more closely, the piece reveals the artist's concern with aesthetics and the assignation of "values or morals" to art. The wall, made of gyproc and wood, is a stoic, if somewhat precarious reminder of architecture as habitation, as morality. The impact of its red plastered surface affirms the piece's anarchical nature. The arches, as symbols of peace, are in conflict and yet coexist with the 7 ft missiles that loom menacingly behind them. They embody the contradictory politics of Reagan's "peace through power" philosophy. Aesthetically, this piece has allusions to surrealist landscape paintings, with its de Chirico-type architecture, conflicting vanishing points, and a suspended state of anxiety. In terms of imagery, it presents a varied selection—from hanging cadavers, to classical arches, to threatening missiles, to a theatrical stage set. The image chosen, the morality or immorality extracted, depends upon the viewpoint of the spectator. Celli presents a piece in which structure and content are one, and in which political intent and comment coincide with the aesthetic.