Michela Picchi and glo present HYPER PORTAL

What is the concept behind your installation? What ideas and inspirations guided the project, and how do they align with the values of innovation, sharing, and positivity that glo represents?

Michela Picchi: As soon as I saw the location, I immediately visualized what I wanted to create: a space that I could make immersive from all perspectives, where I could bring together all the different artistic worlds that live within me, from inflatable art to two-dimensional graphics, including video animation. The courtyard thus becomes a place that extends beyond material limits to reveal an imaginary plane that amplifies our imagination. The transformation of a place into a non-place, or an imaginary place where art and innovation, as they do for glo, walk hand in hand, and where the public can expand their perception through their experience with the space.

Your work is characterized by strong interdisciplinarity, which has allowed you to explore different artistic forms. In this case, the installation is designed for an audience that moves within the space and can admire it from constantly new angles, surprising them each time. How does your artistic approach change when your work transitions from two-dimensionality to three-dimensionality?

Michela Picchi: I’ve always envisioned my two-dimensional work in motion, as part of a more complex scenario. It’s like a single photograph of a scene, a single moment to remember. About a year and a half ago, I felt the need to see the scenario come alive as I envisioned it in motion, not limited to a still image anymore, and developed my first video installation. With this installation, we managed to bring to life two worlds and two realities that are connected to me: the two-dimensional and three-dimensional, which are often divided in the art world. Both worlds live within me, and there was no better space to allow them to coexist in harmony.


Photo Courtesy glo Italia

The relationship between art and technology is a central theme in your work. How has the brand essence and values of glo inspired you in the installation, and how does technology amplify the message you wish to communicate?

Michela Picchi: glo is definitely a cutting-edge brand due to its technological research, constantly improving to provide a better experience with its products for an adult audience. Similarly, my work today is oriented toward significant sensory and perceptual research, and interactive technology will allow me to make the audience an integral part of the creative act.

Immersive and interactive art can create a deep connection with the audience. What emotions or reflections do you hope to evoke so that the viewer is not just an observer, but becomes the protagonist of a unique experience?

Michela Picchi: My goal has always been to create a sensory experience that’s not only interactive but envelops the audience at 360°. Every time I create a video installation, I always have a very specific soundtrack in mind, and for glo, I am working for the first time with a musician and producer to develop a soundtrack that will immerse the audience within the installation.
There’s nothing more incredible than entering and experiencing an immersive environment, a new world, and being enveloped while touching all the senses to complete the experience fully.
I believe that everyone will experience the work with their own emotions and emotional baggage that they bring into the installation. I would like them to feel suspended in a timeless space.


Photo Courtesy of glo Italia

Looking to the future, what artistic directions do you plan to explore? Are there new media, technologies, or concepts that you wish to integrate into your work to continue challenging conventions and offer innovative experiences to the audience?

Michela Picchi: I am working a lot on the concept of Time and Vision, which are at the core of all my latest works, and I would like to delve even deeper into these themes. Last year, I was in front of these white sea stacks on the island of Ponza, an area where you can no longer descend, but many boats are there admiring them. I thought it could be amazing to video-map such a vast area of these white mountains towering over the sea and bring a new moving visual world within nature, with the constantly moving sea beneath them.Bringing a new world into a natural element fascinates me immensely.

How does your art interpret the connection between the individual and the collective, and how do your stylistic and visual choices reflect this fusion of personal and shared experiences within the work?

Michela Picchi: My art often explores the connection between the concept of time and the individual and/or the collective in relation to the latter, highlighting how personal experiences intertwine with shared ones, creating a dialogue between the microcosm of the individual and the macrocosm of society.
Every work I create is the result of an intimate experience, but also an observation of the space in which it lives and the community that will inhabit it for a given period of time. I believe that the individual does not exist in isolation, but always in relation to others, and my art, especially in this interactive installation, reflects this interdependence.