Francesca Piovesan's photographic sculptures open the new Cavea Marini in Milan

Cavea Marini, the new space in the heart of Milan ’s historic Ceppo di Gré® quarry, has opened to the public, and inaugurating it is the multisensory art installation that will remain on view until July 31, 2023, curated by Sabino Maria Frassà in collaboration with CRAMUM. The art director reinterprets the values and history of the company founded in 1897 through Blocco, this is the title of the installation.

At the center of the space, designed by architect Rava, Frassà places Francesca Piovesan’s unprecedented Eco works, created by combining her well-known photographic impressions on glass with Ceppo di Gré, to tell a story made of myth, love and eternity. These new works are inspired by the myth of the nymph Echo, who was consumed by unrequited love for the beautiful Narcissus. Such was the pain that only her voice and petrified bones remained of her.

The idea came from the analogy between Marini Marmi ’s stones and thehuman epidermis used in Francesca Piovesan’s work. The Ceppo di Grè is a blue-gray natural stone, formed 600,000 years ago, which is located in the outermost part of the mountain. Inside, in the heart of the earth, is the valuable Nuvolato di Grè, a very ancient compact “mother” stone formed 200 million years ago. Similarly, Francesca Piovesan understands the skin as container and content, as what separates and unites us with the other from ourselves.

The installation thus intends to give form to the tension in constant becoming toward ever new balances between exteriority and interiority, the very core of our living. “The body becomes stone in order to protect itself. Everything becomes stasis and stillness in immobility,” curator Frassà explains.

Alongside these unseen “photographic sculptures” also find place two works, the largest ever made, from the cycle Aniconic: a mosaic whose pieces are not made of stone but of the artist’s body impressions on tape. The installation Blocco, understood in its totality, is an opportunity to get to know and re-compose the complex apparatus of meaning and content of Francesca Piovesan’s artistic research: if the body is the fulcrum and starting point of her every artistic gesture, the dialogue with her own interiority and with the external world are the strong fil rouge that over the years has accompanied the evolution - not only personal - of the artist. The body in its individuality is denied: there is “only” a universal matter, of which we are all made and in which we cannot but recognize ourselves, but there is also an impalpable individuality suffered, deep, difficult to discover and share with others.

The artist’s works become a continuous source of reflection to reconnect and heal these inner wounds, but they are not nor are they meant to be resolving. Art is intended by the artist as a tool for measuring and knowing oneself better. A journey beyond the “block” that never ends, but which we can only continue to travel.

Visits by appointment Monday through Friday by writing to infocramum@gmail.com

Special opening during DesignWeek: space open daily from 1 to 7 p.m.

Image: Francesca Piovesan, Installation view with works from the Eco cycle on display at Cavea Marini in Milan.

Francesca Piovesan's photographic sculptures open the new Cavea Marini in Milan

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