Pesce is recognised on the artistic scene for the tactile and emotional quality of his design. Constantly searching for new materials to realise his ideas, he has been shaping objects and structures of all kinds with his imagination for over forty years. His creative philosophy is based on a mental and physical elasticity. With his works, he intends to trigger a potentially unlimited process of interpretation of form.

Once again, his creativity has been given a carte blanche, and this time Pesce creates a unique installation, entitled ‘Vieni a Vedere’ (Come and See), inside the Bottega Veneta shop in Via Montenapoleone on the occasion of the new edition of Milan Design Week. The architect and designer creates an immersive installation, which occupies the entire shop and will remain visible to the public for the entire week, from 15 to 22 April.

Using resin and fabric, he has decided to create an immersive path that accompanies the visitor to discover an exclusive edition of two bags made by the maison entirely inspired by the artist’s unmistakable design. My dear mountains and My dear prairies are the perfect synthesis of the maisons craftsmanship and the artists personal memories. They tell us about his youth spent in Este, south of the Euganean Hills, and his life on the American prairies, where he has lived since 1983. In the design, the characteristic braided pattern – made by Bottega Veneta’s leather workers and artisans – is used once again, but in a completely new way according to Pesce’s sketches. Each woven nappa bag is hand-painted using the airbrush technique to resemble the watercolour rendering characteristic of Pesce’s design. The grass, on the other hand, is meticulously crocheted in seven shades of calfskin and green lambskin to evoke leafy grass. Come and See is an itinerary that intends to privilege the sense of discovery through the use of figurative visualisation, an avant-garde concept that places empirical intuition at the basis of what leads to awareness of the meaning of reality.

“The space in which we present the bags is a cave. It is narrow, you go through one at a time, whether underground or above ground, you find a way through it. What you actually cross is the silhouette of a figure intent on shooting hoops. It almost represents a victory, but it is not clear whether it will hit the basket or not. In this case, the victory is a discovery, that of the language of representation. It is about breaking new ground in design”, these are the words from the designer.

The uniqueness of Pesce’s work is his being a totally physical, corporeal and material creator, but at the same time also metaphysical, theoretical and conceptual. Pesce works with his hands, there is always a surprising corporeality in everything he does. But then there is also thought, his work is a doing that passes through the body, but targeting sense rather than sensation. Architect-designer-artist and humanist Gaetano Pesce is a leading figure in each of the fields in which he works; a true multi-disciplinarian with an iconoclastic agenda that despite a career spanning seven decades, still refuses to be vilified or quantified. Pesce is a philosopher of forms and here too, he forces us to think and feel. To clarify with ourselves the relationship we have not only with things, signs and objects, but also – more ambitiously – with the world.