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Prada did not ask about prices, and
Koolhaas decided to introduce a little light
to the complex, so they hired artists to ap-
ply gold colour to the forgotten renaissance
tech by covering the surface with gold leaf
to smarten up the former factory tower.
Purportedly, some 200,000 leaves of pure
gold were used to decorate the tower.
They used gold “in order to exalt some-
thing so modest,” explains Miuccia Prada,
who expects the gold to eventually gain a
patina layer like antique sculptures.
The large complex of the Prada Founda-
tion in Milan consists of several old factory
assembly halls and buildings, as well as a
few newly constructed buildings. “We con-
sciously juxtaposed the new and old,” says
Koolhaas.
The low cinema building with its gleam-
ing façade is new: for the opening ceremony
Roman Polanski made the documentary film
“My Inspiration”. In front of the theatre, in
the middle of the complex, a new gallery
was built completely of glass, which reflects
the gold of the ‘Haunted house’. This also
houses the children’s area with toys, while a
large library is also set to open. The entire
complex has been gifted by Prada to fellow
citizens and it works every day until nine in
the evening.
The golden tower, with its narrow
staircase like those in old church towers,
is entered only at designated times – by
just a few people at once with special
cards – who then silently view works of
only two contemporary artists. Prada ‘sired’
American sculptor Robert Gober and great
French-American artist Louise Bourgeois,
who is attributed with establishing “confes-
sional art”. On display is her work “The
Cell/Clothes” (1996): with a series of doors
she constructed a room-wardrobe which
can only be peeked at through openings
and glass on the doors. In it she placed her
clothes – strongly emotionally charged, for
a woman who is the most impressive wit-
ness of the times that hurt her; on the back
of a white coat is embroidered the sentence
“The cold of anxiety is very real”.
In several other exhibition spaces we
come across many famous works of contem-
porary Italian and international artists that
have been bought with devotion by Prada for
years, as she personally visited studios. This
gallery complex will likely one day grow into
a serious contemporary art museum in Milan.
The central gallery houses the most
important exhibition that opened the Foun-
dation: ancient sculptures borrowed from
the world’s most important museums, the
Louvre, the Vatican, Getty, the Uffizi, from
the Roman and Neapolitan museums of
antiquity. The way the statues are exhibited
has been concocted masterfully by Kool-
haas, setting them on a short stand of dark
travertine and glass.
The central exhibition, Serial Classic,
offers a radical new approach to ancient
art, showing that the value of artwork back
then was not predicated on the notion of an
original idea, but rather the craftsmanship of
repeating motifs from Greek sculpture.
According to exhibition curator Salva-
tore Settis, the exhibition starts from what is
missing, and those are the Greek originals
preserved only in fragments. Discobolus, the
discus thrower of perfect proportions, taut
muscles, a body of subtle clean energy, is
one of the most important Greek sculptures.
The bronze Discobolus was not preserved,
meaning we know it only through Roman
reproductions. From the ancient sculptures
U delu koji se zove
Uvod, veličanstveni
izrezbareni drveni
kabinet iz 15. veka
služi gotovo samo
kao pozadina
za radove Kurta
Švitersa i Džozefa
Kornela
e
In part
that is called the
Introduction, a
magnificent 15th-
century carved
wooden cabinet
serves almost
exclusively as a
backdrop for works
by Kurt Schwitters
and Joseph Cornell
U staroj cisterni izložen je
samo jedan rad Dejmijena
Hersta, „Izgubljena ljubav“
(1999): akvarijum s tropskim
ribama i potopljenom
ginekološkom stolicom,
bisernom ogrlicom, cipelama i
torbicom. Refleksija o gubitku,
tuzi, težini života?
e
In the
old tank is displayed only one
work by Damien Hirst, “Lost
Love” (1999): an aquarium
with tropical fish and a sunken
gynecologist‘s chair, pearl
necklace, shoes and handbag.
Reflections on loss, grief, the
weight of life?