HUBERT MIRROR

Ruins by Roberto Sironi is a series of works that re-signify architectural fragments belonging to different historical periods and great archaeological sites, modelling the forms according to new aesthetic representations. The project relates constructive elements of the classical era, such as bases of columns, capitals, sections of an amphitheatre, with rudiments of the industrial era, such as the double-T beams and the reticular structural elements. Roberto Sironi elaborates on the concept of ruins according to a new perspective. Conceived as contemporary ruins, imaginary simulacra and/or programmed artifices – the materials and techniques of execution do not correspond to the original. The work shows how different fragments of architectural remains can be overlaid and re-signified, resetting the temporal distances and suspending the notion time.

Interest in highlighting ruins as an ar tistic subject grew in the eighteenth century, due to an increase in travel and a growing awareness of historical documentation and archeological excavations. The composition of the colors of the Marmo di Rima in the Hubert mirror, takes inspiration from the romantic painters of the eighteenth century, Robert Hubert (1733-1808), also known as “Robert des Ruines” for his reference of Roman ruins descending into idealized environments.