Giovanni Ozzola
Atto Unico – Campane
Sound beacons, the bells, with their tolling affirm their presence and attract attention up to great distances. Every time a bell rings it attests to its self, marks a moment, a place and an identity, becoming a powerful symbol of existence and uniqueness.
Giovanni Ozzola (Florence, 1982) chooses to create a surprising installation composed of five terracotta bells, which interacts with the public space immersed in the greenery along the Bosco della Nova walk in Mondovì Piazza; thus embellishing an ambitious redevelopment project of an important part of the hill on which the city lies, entrusted to the Proteo Social Cooperative Society by the owner of the land, the Casati Baracco Institute.
The work was born thanks to various collaborations activated in the Monregalese area, in particular with the city of Mondovì.
The choice of clay, a primordial material, immediately brings to mind the biblical expression “Dust you are and dust you will return”. Clay, coming from the earth, almost rises to a memento mori, but its fragility carries within it a concept of cyclicality and rebirth, connecting with the rhythms of nature and therefore with us. Even the process that transforms clay into a bell is significant: each piece is in fact unique, and becomes so thanks to the use of another primordial element: fire. Each bell testifies with its own sound to an individual presence, joining the tolling of the others creates a whole, inviting us to reflect on our existence, our origin and our destiny. They are lighthouses that anchor us to the present and connect us with the eternal cycle of life, reminding us of our uniqueness.
Discover all the installations!
Discover Emilio Ferro installation!
Titolo del Container
Emilio Ferro
Chapel of San Rocco in Vicoforte
From June 8, 2024 Emilio Ferro presents MIRACLE, a site-specific installation conceived for the Chapel of San Rocco, located along the road that leads from the top of the hill to the famous Sanctuary of Vicoforte.
The artist, who has always been attracted to themes that interweave the profound implications between human beings and nature, man-made and natural landscapes, light and shadow, sound and silence, on this occasion creates a work that projects the materiality of nature toward mystical transcendence. Ferro starts from the landscape to imagine new trajectories that traverse the architecture of the ancient building and suggest unexplored paths.
The first element of the installation consists of a suspended metal structure of light, with a pointed shape, with a total development of more than 18 meters, which crosses the Chapel’s interior space projecting out of it and pointing the way to the Shrine. In the outer space behind, a large tree supports a long metal line of light of more than 6 meters: a generating force that germinates from the ground and, thanks to the gentle guidance of the branches, directs itself toward the Chapel, to complete its path in the luminous arrow that ideally guides today’s pilgrim.
The irregularities of natural lines mingle with sharp geometric forms, creating a dynamic balance between opposing forces. A physical and at the same time mystical experience, which Emilio Ferro transfers to his work where the warmth and evocative power of light are intertwined with the metallic element, whose strength he harnesses to the point of sublimation.
The artist is inspired by the pictorial field created by Mattia Bortoloni in the Sanctuary of Vicoforte: that very immense fresco painted under the largest elliptical dome in the world, where the sublime technique of scenographic artifices increases in the observer the desire for transcendence already inspired by the tromp-l’oeil scattered over an area of more than six thousand square meters. An impetus to spiritual asceticism that in Ferro’s work is transformed into light, matter as elusive as ever, which from the enclosed space of the Chapel of San Rocco surprisingly finds a way out to heaven.
Completing the installation is a sound intervention created by the artist for the occasion: after recording the magnetic fields present in the Chapel of San Rocco and the Sanctuary, and the sounds coming from the surrounding landscape, Ferro sampled some fragments of them to compose the psychoacoustic soundtrack that embraces his work.
Chapels such as that of San Rocco, scattered throughout the Monregalese territory, constituted in ancient times a kind of map that pilgrims heading to the Sanctuary of Vicoforte used as reference points in their itinerary. Around the 17th century, thousands of faithful faced long and difficult journeys to reach this place of worship, which became famous for its numerous miracles and whose importance was comparable to the modern sanctuaries of Lourdes and Medjugorje. The spiritual quest, accompanied by the hope of witnessing a miracle, gave this journey a deep and symbolic significance. Similarly, today, the contemporary pilgrim undertakes the journey into nature and art in search of extra-ordinary sensations, of grounding, but also of discovery and elevation. A profoundly transformative experience.
The artist is inspired by the pictorial field created by Mattia Bortoloni in the Sanctuary of Vicoforte: that very immense fresco painted under the largest elliptical dome in the world, where the sublime technique of scenographic artifices increases in the observer the desire for transcendence already inspired by the tromp-l’oeil scattered over an area of more than six thousand square meters. An impetus to spiritual asceticism that in Ferro’s work is transformed into light, matter as elusive as ever, which from the enclosed space of the Chapel of San Rocco surprisingly finds a way out to heaven.
Completing the installation is a sound intervention created by the artist for the occasion: after recording the magnetic fields present in the Chapel of San Rocco and the Sanctuary, and the sounds coming from the surrounding landscape, Ferro sampled some fragments of them to compose the psychoacoustic soundtrack that embraces his work.
Chapels such as that of San Rocco, scattered throughout the Monregalese territory, constituted in ancient times a kind of map that pilgrims heading to the Sanctuary of Vicoforte used as reference points in their itinerary. Around the 17th century, thousands of faithful faced long and difficult journeys to reach this place of worship, which became famous for its numerous miracles and whose importance was comparable to the modern sanctuaries of Lourdes and Medjugorje. The spiritual quest, accompanied by the hope of witnessing a miracle, gave this journey a deep and symbolic significance. Similarly, today, the contemporary pilgrim undertakes the journey into nature and art in search of extra-ordinary sensations, of grounding, but also of discovery and elevation. A profoundly transformative experience.
