“All great literature is one of two stories; a man goes on a journey or a stranger comes to town”. In this short phrase, presumed to have been written in the late 19th century, Lev Tolstoj sums up a timeless and universal law: stories, all stories, whether personal or collective, begin with movement, a journey to somewhere or an arrival from somewhere. All in all, a border crossing.
Visiting the exhibition at Palazzo Reale, the artist Giampaolo Bertozzi came across the works of Galileo Chini, one of his Masters and a role model for Italian and international ceramic arts.
One, ten, eighty càntirs: the traditional terracotta jug with two mouths, famous for its ability to cool liquids and an emblem of the typical conviviality of Barcelona, is the focus of a series of artistic works. The curator Júlia Esqué tells us all about it.
In the northern French region scarred also physically by mining activities, the local antenna of the famous museum went “20,000 leagues below the earth”, investigating the artists’ relationship with the real and imagined universes hidden beneath our feet.
In the Twenties, aesthetic codes borrowed from the avant-garde movements and technical progress went hand in hand to develop a new decorative language: stylised geometric patterns that immediately spoke to a wide audience. A dynamic and treasured expertise handed down by design.
Art Deco was already waning in the early Thirties. This was the time when applied decorative arts made way for industrial design. The language of objects abandons decoration to become synthetic, intuitive, immediate. The extraordinary series of red earthenware vases concluding the exhibition ‘Art Déco. Il trionfo della modernità’ at Palazzo Reale bears witness to this.
A meeting with the author of “Il giardino di notte” to investigate his very personal use of rare earths and light.
The blend of art and technique is a leitmotiv of Art Deco, and here is demonstrated by the magnificent vase by Dagobert Peche, decorated with a spray gun and on display at the exhibition ‘Art Déco. Il trionfo della modernità’ at Palazzo Reale in Milan.
The Lagos-born artist who lives in Canada has been reflecting on the colonial heritage of his country for years, starting from the earth. His works tell how mineral mining has shaped the face of Nigeria.
On 15th April, we have celebrated National Made in Italy Day, recalling the Exposition internationale des arts décoratifs et industriels modernes, which opened in Paris exactly one century ago, in 1925.
