Gianni Caravaggio (b. 1968) characterizes and sees sculpture as “a primary world,” a field within which even the most abstract ideas and thoughts are exposed in physical forms. Cosmological and philosophical thinking, namely by the Greek philosophers as Heraclitus, Zeno, or Plotinus, define and mark Caravaggio’s artistic research. A scholar of philosophy, he is interested in themes addressed in contemporary physics and has spent time in scientific research institutes in France and Germany. Subjects tied to the origins and form of the universe comprise his main focus whereby a preference for a metaphysical approach prevails. His works investigate reality, offering new perspectives for contemplating it and seeking to reestablish the meaning of experience. For the latter applies essentially the experience of time, changing and transforming, intensifying the instant, creating order and disorder. His works suggest that visual and physical experiences are components to our ideas and can question our thoughts.
A particular aspect of his work is the use of diverse, sometimes even unconventional, materials, as lentils, sugar, cosmetic cream, bronze, leather, marble, aluminum, polystyrene, paper, or talcum powder. Often assembled and paradoxically combined – marble with sugar or bronze with chocolate – these materials array a general fragility and perishable nature reinforcing the essence of the artist’s thinking. The minimalism of the objects evokes a certain distance though their form go beyond purely physical presence. Seen as a process of thought, movement, imagination the artwork is an energetic entity amidst an infinite transforming universe.
About things bigger than us shows the most recent works of Caravaggio and his continuous research around questions concerning temporal becoming, imagined possibilities and the universe wherein we live, observe and experience things, both from the inside and outside. A universe in which nature is a powerful, dominant presence. Our existence is relative in comparison to the greatness of nature. Things bigger than us can only evoke a feeling of astonishment and humility. This exhibition is formed from such astonished sensation with nature.