Cosmos. The Volcano Lover
from 14 October 2023 to 7 January 2024
Como
Cosmos. The Volcano Lover
In the year marking the 2000th anniversary of Pliny the Elder, which Como is celebrating in 2023 and 2024, the Como Arte Foundation, in collaboration with the Municipality of Como and the Accademia Pliniana, and under the patronage of the National Committee for the Celebrations of the 2000th Anniversary of the Birth of Pliny the Elder, pays tribute to one of Como’s most illustrious citizens, offering a new interpretation of Pliny’s immense and still-relevant body of work.
The exhibition brings together, in the neoclassical rooms of Villa Olmo, works by 18 contemporary artists with archaeological finds dating back to the ancient Roman era and originating from the Paolo Giovio Archaeological Museum in Como, the Museum of Civilisation in Rome, and the Natural History Museum in Milan, alongside ancient prints from the Achille Bertarelli Collection at the Castello Sforzesco in Milan—both on display in Como for the first time—and from the Natural History Collections of the Alessandro Volta High School in Como.
An ambitious project that demonstrates how the central themes in Pliny’s reflections – in particular, the fragility of knowledge and of the human being, science and natural phenomena, the use and abuse of the land, and nature’s furious reaction when violated – remain of crucial importance in contemporary thought and artistic production.
The works of the 18 artists, selected by curator Sonia D’Alto, span a wide range of artistic languages – from textile art to video art, from site-specific installations to collage – and are placed in close dialogue with the artefacts and antique prints, offering a vision of striking relevance.
The metaphor of the volcano – an erotic force linked to nature, death and rebirth – emerges throughout the entire exhibition. This same force, primordial and overwhelming, is the protagonist of Susan Sontag’s novel *The Volcano Lover* (1992), which inspired the exhibition’s subtitle. The theme of the volcano is also central to Pliny’s biography, as it is inextricably linked to the tragic event in which he lost his life in 79 AD.
The exhibition explores the obsession with wonder, discovery and knowledge. This passion was so strong in Pliny – a lover of the cosmos and of humankind – that it led him to his death in order to save his fellow men and observe at close quarters one of nature’s most powerful phenomena: the volcanic eruption.
THE EXHIBITION ITINERARY
The exhibition route opens with a large portal made of wool yarn by the Slavs and Tatars art collective, inviting visitors to enter Pliny’s world: in the Hall of Mirrors, visitors can admire artefacts from the Paolo Giovio Archaeological Museum in Como – such as oil lamps and balsamari – alongside other important finds unearthed throughout the Como area; precious specimens from the mineralogy, botany and malacology collections of the Natural History Museum of Milan, which have been brought to Como alongside important volumes from the Museum’s Library; precious artefacts come from the natural history collections of the Alessandro Volta High School in Como, whilst a selection of antique prints comes from the ‘Achille Bertarelli’ archive at the Castello Sforzesco in Milan; Finally, a geological survey of the province of Naples arrives from the Museum of Civilisation in Rome.
The dialogue with the contemporary begins right here in this first room: the historical artefacts are displayed alongside the fake fossils by the Moroccan artist Yto Barrada. Pauline Julier is present at Villa Olmo with her documentary *Naturales Historiae*, staged alongside fossils discovered in Mongolia by the artist herself and minerals from the collections of the Natural History Museum in Milan – including a vesuvianite from Monte Somma Vesuvio and a jarred sample of sulphur, gypsum and molisite taken directly from the volcano’s crater. Next, Pauline Curnier Jardin’s work explores the theme of religious and political rituals, as Pliny habitually did in his own life, whilst Lavanya Mani, with her tapestries made in India, celebrates curiosity as a vital tool for knowledge. Mirella Bentivoglio and Mike Kelley transport us to an ideal universe with their dreamlike works, whilst Maria-Tereza Alves, Chioma Ebimana and Rossella Biscotti celebrate the nature so beloved by Pliny.
The Ballroom at Villa Olmo is a tribute to archaeological finds and geology. Smashing [Destrozando] is a work created by Jimmie Durham in Como in 2004, during the Ratti Foundation’s CSAV residency, of which Durham himself was a visiting professor: in the video, the artist is filmed smashing objects in a disconcerting, magnetic and dangerously alluring performance that alludes to the potential senselessness of objects; The same video features the artist Nico Vascellari, who took part in CSAV 2004 and is present at Villa Olmo for COSMOS with *I Hear A Shadow*, a bronze cast of a section of a mountain, a symbol of transcendence and of indomitable strength and energy.
The Teatrino is reimagined by Alice Visentin with two works commissioned specifically for COSMOS: Faccia di Velluto and Lingua, which explore the importance of the oral transmission of knowledge and wisdom.
The Villa’s Chapel hosts Raffaela Naldi Rossano’s work, which combines an exploration of the transformations of light with reflections on the themes of home and travel, an important part of classical Mediterranean mythology. The transgression and irony of Aldo Mondino’s work, featured in the exhibition with his Tappeti, alternate with the work of Petrit Halilaj, in which discarded specimens and furniture from the Natural History Museum of Kosovo evoke the traumatic experience of war. Botany, explored in such depth by Pliny in his work, is reinterpreted by Diana Policarpo through an installation made of fabrics and videos that recount the powers of plants.
The exhibition itinerary – which began with a tribute to the volcano – concludes with the flames and powerful colours of Rose-Marie Eggmann’s tapestries, created using the ‘high warp’ technique, the oldest and most noble method of tapestry weaving.
Cosmos. The Volcano Lover
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