104. GIUSEPPE PENONE: A SPACE BETWEEN OPEN AND CLOSE.

Thoughts in the Roots - SERPENTINE - LONDON.

Giuseppe Penone,‘A occhi chiusi (With Eyes Closed), 2009. Acrylic, glass microspheres, acacia thorns on canvas and white Carrara marble 150 × 510 × 8cm. Photographed by Junzhe Yang for M-A (A SPACE BETWEEN).

‘Skin, like the eye, is a boundary element, the end point capable of dividing and separating us from what surrounds us… It is the point that allows me, still and afterall, to recognise myself.’ G.P.

To think as a millimetre - as a hive - as a frequency - as to blur into focus as a bow pulled to release -

as a tiny fin to slice the air - as to swell as a shoal - to swathe a sky as a swarm - sudden to move - fleeting to last. And to turn in a flash, to spill over and overwhelm - as freckled plague, a rash that risks to engulf.

As a body takes form - to draw and to drain, to protect and to catch - to dissipate, as starlings move as one, and as a landmass appears as a herd from above. As ants scatter in unison - as crop circles interfere nature, signalling - momentous from beyond - futile to resist.

As a map of a city grows - sped to watch in retrospect - as in exhale - as to undulate time - and to imagine such armadas defending docks, sepia as a painted map, russet as Vandyke drops - ink a parchment page - scraping a terrain- a surface of learning - a dedication to note.

And then to realise that these are the thorns of countless, long decayed in petal. A harvest of natural weapons evolved to protect and yet - repurposed by nimble fingers to amass as a holy camouflage of fur.

A crown of thorns lain as vertical carpet, as a tufting of spears, too tender to touch - snagging memories as fibres caught in remembrance.

This bed of nails, this field of rust - as iron filings repelled from a magnetism to hold - once virile of shine - mechanise to prevent now oxidised to dry - brittle, tawny as to fade - as an almost invisible - dusty as powder - porous as pointillist - with closed eyes to remember this passage of time - pertinent as to punctum - drawn back within an instant.

As a sapling slips to dapple - outstretched to glow - to pierce eyes of porcelain - to be held as an arrow darts to tether a forest’s supple charge, to overgrow and overthrow a human want.

Giuseppe Penone

Giuseppe Penone, Thoughts in the Roots, SERPENTINE - Until 7 September 2025.