From 27 June to 10 September 2023, Fabrizio Plessi, one of the pioneers of video art, arrives in the Sala delle Cariatidi of Palazzo Reale in Milan, aboard gigantic boats, inside which a continuous flow of gold flows on television screens.

In one of the most evocative places in the history of Milan, the exhibition Fabrizio Plessi MARIVERTICALI, promoted and produced by the City of Milan - Culture, Palazzo Reale and Studio Plessi is curated by Bruno Corà, Alberto Fiz and Marco Tonelli, with the exhibition project by Lissoni & Partners and welcomes a spectacular site-specific installation.

Historical work updated for the Hall of the Caryatids is composed of twelve steel structures, nine meters high, dedicated to the seas of the planet, inclined to the limit of the fall, in an attempt to maintain the fragile seal. With their precarious balance, the boats represent the metaphor of the contemporary human condition, made up of instability, uncertainties and tensions. With his language, Plessi manages to express urgent collective messages with strength and emotion.

In the last three years, starting from the very first months of the pandemic in 2020, the artist has made water, his element of choice in most of his creations, undergo the transformation into gold: this metamorphosis took place for a series of works entitled L'Età dell'Oro, which also includes the project conceived for the archaeological area of Roman Brixia and for the Santa Giulia Museum in Brescia, on the occasion of Bergamo Brescia Italian Capital of Culture 2023.

Natural resources and in particular water are the most precious assets of our society and this explains the alchemy created by Plessi. On the eightieth anniversary of the bombing that marked the current appearance of the Hall of the Caryatids, the artist's boats stand in defense of the history and beauty of the place, against violence and destruction, just as Pablo Picasso did when, in 1953, he chose this room in the Royal Palace to exhibit Guernica, one of his most painful masterpieces.

“Everything is therefore ready to set sail on these new electronic Noah's arks, raised to the sky for us, incredulous and amazed aboriginal-digital of our time” (Fabrizio Plessi).