Born in 1973 in Treviso, Italy, Lara Favaretto lives and works in Turin. Favaretto’s projects are occasions for the artist to collaborate with an audience in order to co-script magic realist scenarios that will either take place in actual space or simply unfold in thought. Her sculptures, videos, performances and photographs are meeting points. They are sites where dormant ideas await trial by public improvisation. Favaretto’s works often call for a celebration without cause around objects stripped of any possible mysticism – their banal functionality laid bare as an absurd failure that inspires tragic-comic surprise. Her work “Twistle” (2003) is composed of a paper party whistle tied to a pressure tank, which is hooked up to a timer set to release enough air to mechanically blow the whistle at regular intervals. For her 2007 Frieze Art Fair commission “Project for Some Hallucinations”, Favaretto invited the Queen of England to visit the Fair. In her absence, Favaretto pinned the Queen’s letter of decline to the trees inside the tent and staged an imaginary procession by periodically playing a soundtrack of applause.

Lara Favaretto has presented solo exhibitions at Klosterfelde, Berlin (2006 and 2009), Galleria Franco Noero, Torino (2006) and Castello di Rivoli Museo d’Arte Contemporanea, Torino (2005) as well as a special commission for the Frieze Art Fair, London (2007). Her work has also been shown as part of “Making Worlds / Fare Mondi”, 53rd Venice Biennial, Venice (2009), “Provisions for the future”, 9th Sharjah Biennial, Sharjah (2009), “Fisicofollia”, Performa 09, New York (2009), “50 Moons of Saturn”, T2-2nd Torino Triennial at Castello di Rivoli Museo d’Arte Contemporanea, Torino (2008), “Revolution-Forms That Turn”, 16th Biennale of Sydney, Sydney (2008) and “Cinq Milliards d’Années/Une seconde une année” at Palais de Tokyo, Paris (2006). She has been awarded the Prize for Young Italian Art 2004-2005 at MAXXI, Rome (2005) and the Premio Furla per l’Arte (2001).

Lara Favaretto is represented by Galleria Franco Noero, Turin, and Galerie Klosterfelde, Berlin.