At Palazzo Strozzi Jean-Marie Appriou with ‘Canto Infinito’

Jean-Marie Appriou’s work is characterized by an experimental approach in the use of materials, such as aluminium, bronze, glass, clay and wax. Through a highly tactile practice, the artist models figures that fit into an ambiguous territory between the human, the animal and the vegetal. The iconographic references draw on archaic mythologies, science fiction and contemporary culture: horses, snakes, sea creatures and hybrid beings populate a symbolic universe, in which forms seem suspended between earth and water, darkness and light, permanence and change. Often monumental due to their size, Appriou’s sculptures establish an intimate relationship with those who observe them, transmitting a sense of proximity that accentuates their enigmatic and sometimes disturbing presence.

The title of the exhibition for the Project Space of Palazzo Strozzi, “Canto Infinito”, evokes the idea of ​​a continuous flow without beginning or end, suggesting a dimension in which time, matter and imagination are in constant transformation. Conceived as stages of a journey, the works on display recall the legacy of the Divine Comedy as a cultural and symbolic horizon. As in Dante’s poem, “Canto Infinito” suggests a movement through different states of being in which transformation, threshold and metamorphosis become formative principles of the works themselves. Appriou’s work also dialogues with a wider constellation of literary and mythological sources, which emerge not as fixed references, but as presences embodied in the sculptural material and integrated into a spatial sequence. His figures do not illustrate stories, but suggest moments of passage and transition.

Offering an immersive experience, “Canto Infinito” develops as a sequence of encounters in which the sculpture becomes a space that preserves the signs of its creative process and its meaning remains open to interpretation. Without imposing a single interpretation, the project invites visitors to cross a world in which opposing elements, such as body and spirit, past and future, visible and invisible, come together in a dynamic tension, creating an experience that is both sensorial and contemplative.

With “Canto Infinito”, Jean-Marie Appriou transforms the Project Space of Palazzo Strozzi “into a place of imagination and reflection, where matter, myth and vision intertwine in an open dialogue with the present – states Arturo Galansino, general director of the Palazzo Strozzi Foundation – We are particularly happy to present in Florence the work of one of the most original artists on the international contemporary scene, capable of combining archetypal references and an extraordinary formal sensitivity. This project confirms the Palazzo Strozzi Foundation’s commitment to supporting artistic research contemporary through productions and collaborations that encourage new meeting perspectives between the public, artists and our spaces”.