Show dates – 20 November 2018 to 17 February 2019
Internationally recognised Chinese artist Cai Guo-Qiang recently opened his latest solo exhibition, Flora Commedia, at Uffizi Galleries in Florence.
Prior to the opening of the show, the city of Florence had witnessed the majestic daytime explosion event orchestrated by Cai Guo-qiang on November 18 on Piazzale Michelangelo. The explosion, City of Flowers in the Sky, is inspired by Botticelli’s Renaissance masterpiece Primavera. The artist is globally known for his astonishing fire works performances and his continuous exploration of gun powder.
The exhibition engages with a diverse range of aspects of the artist’s creativity - the outdoor daytime explosion event as well as artworks created by igniting gunpowder on canvas and paper.
Flora Commedia establishes a dialogue between the Renaissance spirit and the contemporary art practice of Cai Guo-Qiang. The majority of the forty works on display present flowers created through the use of gun powder. The purity of flowers allows the artist to explore audacious techniques and capture the artistic essence of the great masters of the Renaissance.
Flora Commedia is co-curated by Eike Schmidt, Director of the Uffizi, and by Laura Donati, curator of the Department of Prints and Drawings of the Uffizi.