A new series of monumental sculptures by artist Helidon Xhixha opens at the Boboli Garden in Florence on Tuesday.
Xhixha, currently based between Milan and Dubai, was born into a family of artists in Albania. His works transform stainless steel, polished until it gleams, into abstract forms that are at once massive and delicate.
His most famous work to date, the "Iceberg," is devoted to the issue of climate change. It was the first installation to ever obtain permission to float on the Grand Canal during the Venice Biennale in 2015: a mass of steel emerging from water. For the opening of the London Design Biennale in 2016, Xhixha was commissioned to design the layout of the Somerset House's central courtyard. The result, "Bliss," a series of concentric dramatically split blocks, won him the Public Award.
His Florentine showcase features 15 monumental installations and sculptures spread out over the Boboli Garden and the city at large. Xhixha created eight pieces specifically for this exhibition. The others were created between 2010 and 2016, highlighting the sculptor's recent output overall. These works dialogue with the surrounding environment amidst the Medici family's spectacular centuries-old fountains and grottoes.
The piece entitled "Chaos," created for the Limonaia conservatory in the Boboli Garden, takes inspiration from the Cueva de los Cristales, the Cave of the Crystals, in Naica, Mexico. The extraordinary selenite crystals, measuring up to 14 meters in height and set in an old silver and lead mine, are wonders of the cosmos that here get a powerful artistic twist.
Eike Schmidt, the Director of the Gallerie degli Uffizi, stated of Xhixha's sculptures: "they offer an immediate, gut-level experience to the observer... These highly interactive and communicative objects multiply, separate and distort the observer's image."
The City of Florence has also invited the artist to display a new monumental sculpture, which references the idea of perfection as conceived by painter Giotto da Bondone, in Piazza San Firenze. The work inaugurates the newly renovated square in the city's historical center and its spectacular Baroque and Renaissance architecture, including edifices like the Museo Nazionale del Bargello, the Palazzo Gondi, and the Complex of St. Philip Neri.
Helidon Xhixha's exhibition "At Random" is on view in Florence from June 27 through October 29, 2017.
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