Right in front of the main entrance of the MAR – Ravenna Art Museum, since 2015 it has been possible to admire a life-size bale in mosaic created by the mosaic artist Marco Bravura.
The work, known as RotoB, was realised on the occasion of the 4th edition of the International Festival of Contemporary Mosaic and placed in front of the museum of the city.
In the past, it had been placed in the courtyard of the Basilica of San Vitale and the Mausoleum of Galla Placidia, on the occasion of the Ravenna Mosaico festival in 2009, but also in Venice for the Biennale in 2011 and in Russian Academy in San Petersburg for the exhibition Retrospective 1965-2014.
The work (diameter: 180 cm; width: 120 cm) – made of golden mosaic tiles of three different colours on a fiberglass base – celebrates the importance of recovering and reusing waste materials.
The idea comes from the observation / comparison between the scraps of golden mosaic tiles and scraps of the harvest. It is a wonder made of gold: hay and straw rolled-up in a life-size bale realised with the charming technique of mosaic.
From a symbolic point of view, the gold colour represents something “rich” and “superfluous”, while the hay bale evokes the natural and beneficial qualities of grain.
A contrasting combination in a striking yet simple work, which has great impact, accentuated by its location among the museum’s flower beds.
