P.G.R.

The signs that pain can leave are sometimes evident, others instead remain like small ripples. At other times they still become light slopes, cuts, lines that divide the surface creating contiguous and at the same time distant planes. So it is in the poetics of the artists, who make the clay, container and memory of gestures and lived, welcome their deep sensitivity to the world. An ex voto is an object that brings with it profound anthropological, sociological and artistic requests. A symbol of gratitude, it creates an ancestral bond between matter and the divine, elevating suffering to something sacred. The deep sense of emotion and devotion is identified, in this work, in the form we know best: the heart.
We know that an object is recognized as ex voto, only when it undergoes a transformation, a physical and intent modification. Hence, the hearts become planes, lines, shadows that follow one another in shape and size, as if to say: to each his own. And the gesture is repeated, as in a rosary, in which each part is similar but different, each time it is the same but it is also another. It is a mantra that cures, that heals wounds, that makes every line that touches a plan repeat, that everything always changes, that a gesture creates the difference.
The installation has a strong emotional impact: anyone can recognize themselves in the act of thanksgiving and at the same time in the memory of suffering. Without wishing to dwell too much on the past period, which undoubtedly affected the lives of many even with serious losses, this work undoubtedly represents a great gesture of hope and comfort, the possibility of moving forward.
The stylized rays of light, direct projection of the shadows of the piece, tell us about this double value that human existence has: we know light because there is a shadow that reminds us that it exists.
Bringing out the shape of light from the projection of the shadow not only has a very high symbology, but it perfectly aligns this oxymoron of life.
The black colour of the clay, of the earth after the raku cooking, recalls the ancient, a deep gesture that has always been with man. The mirror is instead contemporary, neutral, where everyone can find a part of himself.
The form of the shadow of matter is at the same time light, bright and opaque, as if to say that not everything can be reflected, but something must be restrained.
- Semi-refractory clay construction, raku cooking, cristal mirror