when nature was young

The sensation of nature and landscape is a central theme in the works of the Italian artist Gianni Caravaggio (b. 1968). His poetic sculptures and installations awaken memories of emotions evoked by experiences of nature. They aim at the essential unity of humans and nature, at the ‘pure sensation’ (Malevich) of something genuinely natural.

Caravaggio’s works are timeless and have no reference to the social present, past, or future. Instead, they result from concrete relationships between matter, space, time, and the acting subject and could therefore also be described as four-dimensional sculpture. The combination of typical materials – bronze, marble, or wood – with everyday materials such as talcum powder, fishing line, salt, or sugar, as well as the reduced staging of the sculptures directly on the floor, creates a special attraction that at times recalls the Arte Povera of the twentieth century.