Beautiful Water Bones by Loris Cecchini ~ Venice

Waterbones

by Loris Cecchini

Venice Biennale 2017

at the Fondaco die Tedeschi 

During the Venice Biennale there are art installations all over Venice. You just can't see everything. You'd have to spend a month! So, sometimes you have to go off of a photo and other times you just happen upon a space that has a sign out front and pop in for a look. In this case it was the former.

I'd seen an intriguing photo advertising this site specific installation by Italian artist Loris Cecchini and curated by Hervé Mikaeloff. It was made from thousands of movable thin steel modules. "A nod to algorithms found in nature and industrial design materials." 

To me it felt like being in some kind of space age organism ... 

"The title, “Waterbones,” underlines the morphological lightness and freeness and appears as a biological metaphor: The cells open and bloom, releasing molecular components in interaction with the space, developing autonomous and self-sufficient ways."

~Loris Cecchini

The shapes and materials were reflective and beautiful! Though they were not moving, they seemed to dance through space. I wish I could have laid on the floor under them and listened to Bach. They felt somehow musical to me. 

It's funny because I read the following quote after writing the above.

"The installation is composed of eight thousand identical elements in shiny steel linked together. The structure is continually varying thanks to the element’s hookup system. The particularity stands in the geometry of each element and in the fact that they are internally empty: This creates a great lightness in the overall structure that gives me the possibility to expand and contract the form in an organic way, almost as if it were becoming a biological element. The final result is a great “dancing” form in the space that is offered in continuity with the architectural structure."

~Loris Cecchini

As modern as the space looks, the actual building opened in 1228 and is a historic building right on the Grand Canal in Venice. It was rebuilt after a fire in the 1500s in the Italian Renaissance style. It's right near the Rialto Bridge and used to be the headquarters and restricted living quarters of Venice's German merchants.

In the 20th century it was used by Venice for the "Poste Italiane" and in 2008 it was bought by the Benetton Group. Rem Koolhaas was hired to incorporate a huge shopping area inside. There were a lot of beautiful things but I was on an art mission and didn't stop to shop!

“I have devised my creative language around the ideas of the object, the model and architecture. Often the work refers in different ways to the idea of inhabiting space. Currently, I am exploring the space of sculpture and of the environmental installation according to a notion of the parcelization of material, almost a sort of molecular deflagration of sculpture, in which scientific phenomenology becomes an intimate structure and go-between for vision ..."

~Loris Cecchini

View from the roof of the Fondaco dei Tedeschi

I love how seeing various kinds of artists broaden you perspective of what art can be and also how it  impacts your immediate mood or state of mind. This experience has happened to me over and over visiting many art exhibitions. On this occasion, I did leave with a sense of lightness and a burst of positive energy that still took me by surprise!

For more of the interview with Loris Cecchini click here

More Links

Loris Cecchini (official site more works and a slide show)

Fondaco Rooftop Terrace

Duty Free Venice/Fondaco dei Tedeschi

Venice Biennale

Ciao Tutti!

Blessings and light!

Federico Severino at the Chiesa di San Vitale Rome

Two and half years ago, while browsing the Franco Senesi Gallery in Positano, my parents and I came across the work of a sculptor I'd never heard of, Federico Severino, born in 1953. The work was passionate and emotional, with movement, and a wonderful rawness and organic nature about. Much of his work in that gallery was based on mythology. 

Come to find out that not only was he commissioned to create an altar for a church in Rome, Chiesa di San Vitale, they were showing additional (more biblical) pieces there, as well. We were heading back to Rome so this was perfect! We also found out he was currently working on another commission at that time ... sculptures for the 12 stations of the cross ... for the Pantheon in Rome!

 

The Altar

Eve ...

Eve looking toward The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse!

Uh oh ...

Here they come!

To see videos of his process in making the stations of the cross for the Pantheon, check out these videos. Yes, it's in Italian but it's worth the watch!! :)

To Read Federico Severino's Bio and see more of his work, click here.

To see each of the stations of the Cross that he created, click Here and Here.

I'm leaving soon for Rome and can't wait to see his work in the Pantheon in person!!!

I found this on the Gaiam website blog ... Love the Sufi poet Hafiz!!! 

Somehow it seemed to fit with this man's great art. 

I have come into this world to see this:
the sword drop from men's hands even at the height
of their arc of anger
because we have finally realized there is just one flesh to wound
and it is His - the Christ's, our
Beloved's.
 
I have come into this world to see this: all creatures hold hands as
we pass through this miraculous existence we share on the way
to even a greater being of soul,
a being of just ecstatic light, forever entwined and at play
with Him.

I have come into this world to hear this:
every song the earth has sung since it was conceived in
the Divine's womb and began spinning from
His wish,

every song by wing and fin and hoof,
every song by hill and field and tree and woman and child,
every song of stream and rock,
 
every song of tool and lyre and flute,
every song of gold and emerald
and fire,

every song the heart should cry with magnificent dignity
to know itself as
God:
for all other knowledge will leave us again in want and aching -
only imbibing the glorious Sun
will complete us.
 
I have come into this world to experience this:
men so true to love
they would rather die before speaking
an unkind
word,
men so true their lives are His covenant -
the promise of
hope.

I have come into this world to see this:
the sword drop from men's hands
even at the height of
their arc of
rage
because we have finally realized
there is just one flesh
 we can wound.

~Hafiz

Hope this finds you all happy and healthy!

Blessings and light!

And ...

Happy Holidays!