Still Life

In the heart of the Venerable Ambrosian Librarya place of history and beauty in the centre of Milan, the exhibition comes to life Still Life of the sculptor Jago, edited by Maria Teresa Benedetti and organised with Arthemisia. The project is part of the Library's efforts to promote dialogue between contemporary art e great masterpieces of the past.

Protagonist of the confrontation is the famous Fruit soup by Caravaggiopreserved in the museum's collection, put in relation to a powerful and provocative sculpture by Jago: a basket no longer of fruit, but filled with weapons. Pistols, rifles and machine guns carved in the marbleeternal symbol of the Italian artistic traditionbecome a metaphor of the present, denouncing a reality in which the violence has become an integral part of our daily lives.

The exhibition explores in depth the theme of transience of lifetransforming classical language into a social and cultural denunciation. Jago tackles the concept of still life with a very topical reflection, in which the beauty of decadence gives way to the coldness of weapons, instruments built to destroy, which have become the new 'fruits' of our time.

In this comparison between sculpture and painting, between today and yesterdaythe visitor is invited to question what is left of life when the time and thehumanity consume it.

^{Credit: Michelangelo Merisi known as Caravaggio Basket of Fruit, 1597-1600 Oil on canvas, 47×61 cm Veneranda Biblioteca Ambrosiana, Pinacoteca - Milan ©Veneranda Biblioteca Ambrosiana / Mondadori Portfolio}