Galleria 1000eventi e Galleria Sperone - Roma, Milano
The Byzantine World (Milan and Rome, March–April 1999)
Galleria 1000eventi and Galleria Sperone
curated by Gian Enzo Sperone
In March 1999, Aldo Mondino presented an unforgettable visual and sensory paradox, staging his solo exhibition The Byzantine World simultaneously at Galleria 1000eventi in Milan and Galleria Sperone in Rome.
The project stemmed from an intuition quintessentially Mondinian: to reinterpret the solemnity and mysticism of the Byzantine mosaic tradition through the use of a raw material as ephemeral, pop and profane as chocolate. The artist thus replaces the rigid stone and vitreous paste tiles with thousands of Peyrano chocolates, wrapped in metallic wrappers with vibrant reflections that mimic the gold of Ravenna and Constantinople.
At the centre of the two exhibitions stands the monumental panel of the same name, composed of over twelve thousand chocolates, evoking the outlines of Hagia Sophia, a manifesto of a cultured, ironic and profoundly free cultural nomadism. A total multisensory experience is thus activated within the gallery spaces, where the eye is captivated by golden glints and the sense of smell is enveloped by the lingering scent of cocoa. With this double exhibition, Mondino once again demonstrates his extraordinary ability to liberate art history from its own rigidity, blending the wisdom of ancient mosaics with a taste for assemblage and subverting the sacred through the play of visual seduction.
Poster for the exhibition "The Byzantine World"
Aldo Mondino all'inaugurazione della mostra "The Byzantine World"