Bottega Veneta & Gaetano Pesce Present 'Vieni a Vedere' @ Salone del Mobile in Milan

The Humanist architect-designer-artist Gaetano Pesce is a towering figure in each of his fields; a true multidisciplinarian with an iconoclastic agenda who, despite a career spanning seven decades, still refuses to be cowed or quantified. In numerous public and private works realized globally, in the fields of architecture, town planning, interior design, industrial design and exhibition design, the constant experimentation of an artist who refuses repetition infuses all.

Following the commission given to Pesce to create a temporary site-specific artwork as show space for the Summer ’23 Bottega Veneta fashion show, the dialogue continues and a further stage is explored. Once again given creative carte blanche, and this time situated in the brand’s Montenapoleone store, Pesce creates a unique installation called ‘Vieni a Vedere’ (Come and See). Spanning the store, the immersive installation utilizes resin and fabric to create a unique experience that the visitor travels through. It frames an edition of handbags realised by Bottega Veneta for the artist according to his designs.

Embracing figuration and stories of the personal rather than the purely functional, Pesce’s bags utilize the idiosyncratic both in terms of handcraft and creativity. Based on mountains and prairies, the handbags echo his early life in Italy growing up near the mountains in Este, and the prairies of America, a reflection of where he lives today.

“This is my first design of a bag and it is figurative – two mountains with a sunrise or a sunset behind. I wanted a bag with an optimistic view. There is a capacity to realize anything at Bottega Veneta and this bag opens up a way to express future design. The design of the future has to be figurative and it has to communicate – such an object has to tell a story.” Gaetano Pesce

The installation is on view through April 22, where the artist’s edition of handcrafted handbags can also be purchased. Look out for an interview of Pesce in our forthcoming SS23 Utopia issue, also available for preorder April 22.

 
Stone Building with windows covered with green watercolor style art and "BOTTEGA VENATA" across the front of the building.
 

Tea Hacic-Vlahovic's Debut Memoir-Cum-Milanese Fever Dream Is Now Available

Tea Hacic is an MDMA-fueled Oscar Wilde with fake eyelashes and this book is a Fear and Loathing for the late Berlusconi-era; a deep walk of shame that tiptoes between a bewildering Bildungsroman and a fever dream of social climbing and social embarrassment. Click here to order now online and in print.

Kate Crawford & Trevor Paglen: Training Humans @ Osservatorio Fondazione Prada In Milan

Training Humans, conceived by Kate Crawford, AI researcher and professor, and Trevor Paglen, artist and researcher, is the first major photography exhibition devoted to training images: the collections of photos used by scientists to train artificial intelligence (AI) systems in how to “see” and categorize the world.

In this exhibition, Crawford and Paglen reveal the evolution of training image sets from the 1960s to today. As stated by Trevor Paglen, “when we first started conceptualizing this exhibition over two years ago, we wanted to tell a story about the history of images used to ‘recognize’ humans in computer vision and AI systems. We weren’t interested in either the hyped, marketing version of AI nor the tales of dystopian robot futures.” Kate Crawford observed, “We wanted to engage with the materiality of AI, and to take those everyday images seriously as a part of a rapidly evolving machinic visual culture. That required us to open up the black boxes and look at how these ‘engines of seeing’ currently operate”. Training Humans is on view through February 24 2020 at Osservatorio Fondazione Prada Corso Vittorio Emanuele II, 20121 Milano

Joshua Miller: Liquid Products and Frozen @ T293 Gallery In Rome

“There is a central character in these paintings, and it’s Painting or Language itself. It’s as if there were a being which put on many outfits and spoke in many voices in order to achieve it’s objective: communication. The story is ‘the history of painting.” Joshua Miller

‘Liquid Products and Frozen Form’is the first Italian exhibition of the American artist Joshua Miller (1981, Colorado, United States). Seven large canvases will lead the spectator on a path that, exploring the phenomenology of the visual language, assumes the form of an imagery atlas that will tell the history of painting. Drawing inspiration from popular culture, Miller paints simple and everyday objects with an unusual and original approach. The artist experiments with old techniques and juxtaposes varied pictorial styles to obtain an emotional and expressive structure which exposes the entire range of moods and personalities inherent to painting. Liquid Products and Frozen is on view through October 23 at T293 Via Ripense 6, Roma

Watch The Music Video For Cairobi's Track "Lupo" Made Entirely With Magic Markers

Cairobi have shared a psychedelic video for their new single "Lupo" made completely with magic markers by Sebaldo. Cairobi are a headily eclectic globe-crossing fourpiece of Giorgio Poti (vocals, guitars), Alessandro Marrosu (bass), Salvador Garza (keys) and Aurelien Bernard (drums). Their psych-pop, world music bordering sound reflects their various backgrounds from Italy and Mexico via France. "Lupo" follows the band's 2014 Distant Fire EP and the single "Gristly Words," which is taken from their forthcoming debut record along with EP track Zoraide. Lupo is a hypnotically lush yet despondently exultant track featuring exotic grooves and synth-dappled psychedelic haziness. Cairobi is set to play on August 10 at the Contronatura Festival in Italy. Click here to purchase the single. 

Christo and Jeanne-Claude's "Floating Piers" Installation On Lake Iseo in Lombardy, Italy

For sixteen days – from June 18 through July 3, 2016 – Italy’s Lake Iseo was reimagined. 100,000 square meters of shimmering yellow fabric, carried by a modular floating dock system of 220,000 high-density polyethylene cubes, undulated with the movement of the waves as The Floating Piers rose just above the surface of the water, giving people a chance to literally walk on the water. The installation was temporary, but you can pre-order the book, which gives an in-depth look at the project. photographs by Emilien Crespo

10 Exhibitions You Need to See at the 56th Venice Biennale

What is the Venice Biennale and why is everyone talking about it? – The Venice Biennale is largely considered one of the most important art exhibitions in the world. Located in Venice, Italy, the exhibition is sort of like the art world's Olympics - each country chooses a single artist as a representative and that artist is given a "pavilion" to show their work. This year, there are over 136 artists and 53 countries showing. There are also many satellite and pop up exhibitions.  Here are Autre's picks for the top exhibitions. 1. U.K. artist Sarah Lucas presents 'I Scream Daddio' for the British Pavilion 2. The late Mario Merz will be holding an exhibition, entitled 'Unreal City,' at the Gallerie dell’Accademia di Venezia 3. The late, great Cy Twombly will have an exhibition entitled 'Paradise' at Ca'Pesaro 4. New York based artist Aurel Schmidt will be showing her series 'New Gods' at Cannaregio 5. Part of the unique Vanhaerents Collection will be on display for an exhibition entitled Heartbreak Hotel at the Zuecca Projects Space 6. Jonas Mekas: Internet Saga at the Palazzo Foscari Contarini 7. Artist Rob Pruitt's unique Flea Market in Venice will be on display at A Plus A gallery 8. Pamela Rosenkranz has been nominated by her country to exhibit at the Swiss Pavilion with an exhibition that averages European skin color 9. At the age of 78, Joan Jonas represents the United States at the 56th Venice Biennale with They Come To Us Without A Word 10. Frontiers Reimagined, a major group exhibition with 44 artists will be on view at Museo di Palazzo Grimani

[PHOTO DIARY] Postcard from Padova

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"Why did they make birds so delicate and fine as those sea swallows when the ocean can be so cruel?" -- E.H.

We have finished filming and now holiday has officially begun ... I've been laying by the pool revisiting The Old Man and the Sea, as the drum of essential relaxation kicks, cloaked in reverberation.  In two daisies we will drive south to the heal, where the land smells of mafioso. Photo and text by Dustin Lynn who is in Italy shooting another short fashion film for Corto Moltedo.