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'Mosaico': Walking among millennia of Italy's mosaic art
Colorful tiles adorn many structures in numerous Italian cities, revealing the history of mosaic art spanning millennia across the boot-shaped peninsula.
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Timeless beauty: Visitors view a mosaic art on Aug. 6, 2024 in the “Mosaico: Italian Code of a Timeless Art” exhibition at Ciputra Artpreneur in Kuningan, South Jakarta, held to celebrate 75 years of bilateral relations between Indonesia and Italy. (JP/Nur Janti)
T
o celebrate 75 years of bilateral relations between Indonesia and Italy, the Italian Cultural Institute of Jakarta is holding a multimedia exhibition featuring the country’s famed mosaic art at Ciputra Artpreneur in Kuningan, South Jakarta.
Running from Aug. 7 to 28, “Mosaico: Italian Code of a Timeless Art” was organized in collaboration with the Italian Embassy and PT Piaggio Indonesia, maker of the popular Vespa brand.
The transmedia exhibition invites visitors to explore the profound interconnections between Italy’s culture, history and creativity through mosaic art through a convergence of archive material, graphic animation, audiovisual footage, drone and underwater films, as well as a specially composed soundtrack that is provided before entering the gallery.
Although stone and glass cannot speak, the ancient tiles nevertheless tell the tale of how mosaic art developed in Italy, particularly in Rome, Pompeii, Aquileia, Ravenna, Palermo, Monreale, Piazza Armenia and Baiae.
“Mosaic art is an artistic technique that has been discovered since 3,000 BC, starting from Mesopotamian mosaics and finally spreading throughout the Greek and Roman empires,” Maria Battaglia, director of the Italian Cultural Institute, said on Aug. 6.
One of the works showcased in the exhibition is the cycle of the Creation series that adorns the Palatine Chapel, built in the Italo-Byzantine architectural style in Palermo, Sicily.
The mosaic art, set in a golden background, covers all surfaces of the chapel, illustrating stories about the lives of Jesus Christ, Saint Peter and St. Paul. The image of Christ is enveloped in light, which is associated with life: to live and walk in the light, to escape from the darkness to become children of the light.
