Furla Series, Kelly Akashi Transforms the GAM into an Inner Journey
The Fondazione Furla transforms the space of the Galleria d’Arte Moderna in Milan into a dreamlike landscape filled with plants, flowers, shells, and parts of the human body. This is thanks to the delicate and visionary art of Kelly Akashi, the protagonist of the sixth edition of the Furla Series. An American artist of Japanese descent, the forty-one-year-old Akashi presents “Converging Figures,” curated by Bruna Roccasalva and promoted by Fondazione Furla and GAM – Galleria d’Arte Moderna, Milan. This project, which Akashi realized by molding elements such as glass, wax, and bronze, aims to explore existential issues like time and space, the impermanence of the natural world, the transience of the human body, and entropy, through a different perspective in which humans are not the center of everything, but merely a part of it.
The exhibition (open until December 8) was inaugurated the other night at the GAM with an exclusive dinner. Guests wandered, curious and fascinated, through the various works of the Los Angeles-born artist, displayed in a path that weaves through the permanent collection. The dinner party saw the participation of numerous figures from the worlds of art and culture, such as Giovanna Furlanetto, Simone Menegoi, Vincenzo de Bellis, Silvia Grilli, Nicole Saikalis Bay, Nicola Ricciardi, Luigi Fassi, and Alice Guareschi. A rendezvous set amidst past works and contemporary creations, it was a magical reflection on the passage of time and on ourselves.
Photo: Ludovica Arcero
Text: Germano D’Acquisto
