(born Biella in 1933)
Porta bianca, 2007, signed, dated and inscribed Attraverso il Segno Arte, Michelangelo Pistoletto con Gianna Nannini 2007 on the reverse, sublimation print on aluminium mirror + sound, unique piece, 250 x 125 cm, (MCC)

View this three-dimensional object in our short Video.

Photo certificate issued by the artist

The work has been registered by the artist’s archive under the archive no. 466 (written on the reverse)

Provenance:
Galleria Pieroni, Rome
Acquired there by the current owner – Private Collection, Italy

Exhibitions:
Milan, Suono e forma - Il Terzo Paradiso (con Gianna Nannini), BunKerart, February - April 2007;
Moscow, Terzo Paradiso - Michelangelo Pistoletto - Gianna Nannini, NCCA - National Center for Contemporary Arts, November - December 2007;
Minsk, Il Terzo Paradiso - Michelangelo Pistoletto e Gianna Nannini, die Nationale Schönheitsschule, Minsk, April - May 2008;
Bari, Intramoenia extra Art: Michelangelo Pistoletto - Il Terzo Paradiso/ Gianna Nannini, Castel Svevo, December 2008 - March 2009; Rome, Il Terzo Paradiso, MAXI, March - August 2011

In 2003 Pistoletto wrote The Third Paradise manifesto and drew its symbol, the New Infinity Sign, created by reconfiguring the mathematical infinity sign. The two external circles represent Nature and Artifice; two contrasting poles, the conjunction of which fertilises the Third Paradise. This third circle is the maternal womb of a new thought, the expression of the sustainable coexistence of the natural and artificial spheres. The centre of the new sign of infinity is the point that is ideally intersected by the umbilical cord uniting past, present and future generations. The year 2007 saw the beginning of a collaboration with Gianna Nannini on Third Paradise, which found its expression in the installation MAMA-Terzo Paradiso, displayed in numerous exhibitions and publications between 2007 and 2009, all of which were curated by Achille Bonito Oliva. “It is only consistent if, in the transition from individual artist to collective artist, Michelangelo Pistoletto finds the possibility to establish a creative duo with an artist who comes from the immaterial language of music, Gianna Nannini. In this case, we have a dual artist who founds an aesthetic field manifesting itself in different moments, with both images and sound.”
The installation is comprised of different mirroring elements made of aluminium (a recyclable material that is in keeping with the artist’s commitment in favour of environmental sustainability) arranged around a centre “consisting of the infinity sign, which is assembled by means of a number of rags, which is obviously reminiscent of Pistoletto’s ‘Zoo’ and ‘Venus of the rags’ [...] However, the entire field is pervaded by a heartbreaking melody sung by Gianna Nannini’s hidden voice articulating and mumbling one and the same word that is both elementary and universal: Mama, a word that is recognisable by anyone, suggestive of regression but that is also a maternal promise for mankind, past and present finding its visual expression, naturally, in the infinity sign. Gianna Nannini’s husky voice oscillates between primordial reference and musical articulation, promising a modulation of sound that is, paradoxically, never a simple repetition. Rather, it is the flatus vocis of an image that finally finds its concrete expression and bounces onto another wall by means of a double shot showing Gianna Nannini in a posture that indicates, signals and repeats one of Pistoletto’s visual codes, namely the form of the letter A, which is, of course, an abbreviation of Art.”
(Achille Bonito Oliva, in “La Repubblica”, Michelangelo Pistoletto, L’invenzione del Terzo Paradiso, 19 November 2007)