POV, the image of the Fuorisalone 2024

A log of wood grown in Val Susa, a block of ice, a block of lava stone, one of marble and a slab of slate: these five elements have been chosen to abstract the theme launched by Fuorisalone for the 2024 edition, Materia Natura (that can be translated as “matter nature”).
Nicola Ricciardi, Artistic Director of miart, has curated the production of this visual storytelling which accompanies the theme. He has thus involved EX., a research and design group that works at the intersection of art, landscape, technology and architecture, formed by architects Andrea Cassi and Michele Versaci, who worked together with Giorgio Ferrero (MYBOSSWAS).


©️ EX. (Andrea Cassi e Michele Versaci) e Giorgio Ferrero (MYBOSSWAS) / NContemporary

“There are different sensibilities at play: architecture, cinematography, art and design. The aim from which we started in building the visual representation of Materia Natura was to unite all these points of view and produce images that convey these different sensitivities, but which also had the strength to capture attention by talking about the theme" - explains Nicola Ricciardi.


©️ EX. (Andrea Cassi e Michele Versaci) e Giorgio Ferrero (MYBOSSWAS) / NContemporary

The visual representation of Materia Natura is therefore composed of a series of five different photographic works - more than one precisely to tell how matter and nature are multiple and complex - which represent the impact of man on the environment. These iconic and evocative natural elements thus bear the signs of the actions with which natural material is transformed into an object, summarizing the manipulation of the element and highlighting the gap between human intervention and the natural component.


©️ EX. (Andrea Cassi e Michele Versaci) e Giorgio Ferrero (MYBOSSWAS) / NContemporary

This process is shown “with other eyes” in these images, thanks to the use of ultraviolet frequency lights not visible to humans, which therefore generate other images.
Therefore, the world of science was also involved in this dialogue, because the three authors worked with UV lights precisely to be able to return different colors, corresponding to different wavelengths, broadening thus the theme of vision and questioning the points of view: the result is an artificial effect, given by a natural principle. “We explored the relationship between matter and nature, and at the same time we questioned the nature of matter,” says EX.


©️ EX. (Andrea Cassi e Michele Versaci) e Giorgio Ferrero (MYBOSSWAS) / NContemporary

“The attempt was to represent a simple object by photographing it in reality without special effects, with a light that is not typical of the human visual spectrum. In doing so, a banal object on which man has left his mark can become another object, that destabilizes perception, as if it were seen by another living being. The unique point of view of the human being is thus called into question" - says Giorgio Ferrero.