The exhibition takes its lead from the shut relationship between the artist and the curators born on the event of the third version of “Una Boccata d’Arte” (2022)—a recent artwork mission unfold all through Italy—which noticed Lucia Cantò because the protagonist of the intervention Restrizione emotiva (Emotional Restriction) within the village of Malamocco, within the province of Venice.

Presenting completely different evolutions of Lucia Cantò’s analysis strains, “Stelle che sorreggono altre stelle” focuses specifically on two elements that characterise the artist’s most up-to-date manufacturing: the vase as a major presence in an area and the doable types of collaboration with a short lived group. Two views that, explored of their embryonic part on the event of Restrizione Emotiva, are actually deepened and put into relation by presenting a collection of recent works and amplifying the phases of participation within the artist’s work.

As curators Giovanni Paolin and Sara Maggioni state ““Stelle che sorreggono altre stelle” (Stars supporting different stars) needs to get nearer to individuals and turn out to be interwoven with relationships, welcoming the viewer and mimicking a dwelling course of, due to its personal inside rhythm and the presence of an lively workshop, aimed toward stimulating a metamorphosis in its members. Certainly, the very circularity expressed by the phrases of the title recollects a constantly-renewed technique of respiration that marks the passage of time.”

Flanking the exhibition is a workshop programme, began via an open name and commenced in September 2023, through which a gaggle of members, no matter age, gender or occupation, is requested to create a self-portrait within the type of a terracotta vase. An expertise that additionally finds area in the course of the first interval of the exhibition, with the creation on the higher flooring of the Fondazione of a working atmosphere through which alternatives for poetic reflection, sensible workshops and moments of course of sharing are interwoven.

On the finish of the workshop, the primary flooring will probably be reworked from a working area into an area devoted to the exhibition of the collectively produced vases. To replicate this transformation, the constructions within the room have been designed via a dialogue between the artist and Studio GISTO. This has resulted in a collection of modules conceived for steady transformation, doable via other ways of meeting, to facilitate processes, outcomes and on the identical time form a collective workspace.

The bottom flooring of the Fondazione is alternatively devoted to a few new productions that introduce the artist’s imaginative and prescient, whereas additionally offering keys to the interpretation of the workshop. Madre (2023), Edilizia di un pensiero (2023) and Stellario (2023) are seen on the identical time, managing to coexist whereas nonetheless remaining autonomous. Embracing varieties which might be expensive to Cantò, all of the works motive in response to sharp contrasts and symbolic corporeity.

Madre (2023) is a terracotta sculpture comprising three items assembled to type a balanced complete, through which one factor homes and on the identical time conceals the junction of two others.  Since historic occasions, pottery manufacturing revolved round feminine communities and was aimed on the collective operate of remodeling and preserving meals. This exercise was inevitably linked to the feminine reproductive and transformative energy. The sculptural physique is a concretisation of a thought that stems from the gathering of feminine voices, transcribed by the artist in notebooks throughout conversations with girls near her.

Composed of heterogeneous supplies, the set up Edilizia di un pensiero (2023) confronts the customer with strongly contrasting components, whose dialogue conveys an concept of fragility. The scaffold edge safety constructions, initially meant for making a protected space and to deflect constructing supplies falling from a development web site, have been overturned as regards their operate, with their apertures housing a gaggle of flowers dealing with outwards. The sculptural set up acts as a magnifying glass directed onto the inevitable drying technique of the flowers, held after which allowed to fall over time, every following its personal rhythm of life. This course of helps the beholder to maintain observe of the completely different phases that give rise to “Stelle che sorreggono altre stelle,” because it reveals short-term modifications and transformations in its course.

Lastly, the sculpture Stellario (2023) takes its title from the article it’s impressed by: a bronze crown with twelve stars, discovered by the artist throughout a keep in Naples. Within the work offered, there is no such thing as a hierarchy between the seven components that compose it, however every of them collaborates with the others, supporting them and permitting itself to be supported. This work, which closes the exhibition on the bottom flooring and results in the higher flooring devoted to the collective workshop, impressed the very title of the exhibition.

As indicated by the title, which refers back to the delicacy of invisible cyclical relationships and the drive generated by small constellations of factors of sunshine, “Stelle che sorreggono altre stelle” strikes in response to a rhythm marked by completely different life cycles, linked to the creation and lifetime of the works themselves: a primary second through which the artist’s works and a few outcomes of the workshop are offered is adopted by a second second through which a part of the exhibition format is modified, remodeling the work area into a spot for the completed self-portraits.

Curated by
Giovanni Paolin and Sara Maggioni

at Fondazione Elpis, Milan
till February 4, 2024