Catalog Vivere L’estinzione

The exhibition brings together three artists who, through different languages, tackle the ecological crisis of the present from a decentered perspective that challenges human centrality. The works of Roux-Fontaine, Branca, and Vicari construct a system of references and correspondences where forests, trees, plant organisms, objects, traces, and artificial structures become images of a new planetary condition, rooted in the interdependence of all living forms.

In Eric Roux-Fontaine’s paintings, lush tropical forests, impenetrable jungles, and visionary environments welcome minimal, almost negligible human presences. Works like “The Heart of the World” (2026), “Passenger” (2025), and “In the Shadow of the Stars” (2025) convey an image of precariousness, where humanity loses its centrality and confronts the vastness of the surrounding world. Artificial and incongruous elements, from the abandoned living room in “New Chapter” (2026) to the chandelier in “The Monarch’s Chamber” (2026), introduce a sense of estrangement that transforms the forest into an organism capable of absorbing architectures, objects, and cultural memories.

Mario Branca’s sculptures, on the other hand, reveal a universe where vegetation and industrial artifacts coexist within hybrid and symbiotic structures. His copper trees, grafted onto reinforced concrete bases, seem to emerge from the anthropic landscape through slow processes of sedimentation, oxidation, and metamorphosis of matter. In the “Onirica” series, trees, chairs, nests, snails, and eggs compose a suspended narrative where domestic objects lose their original function and are assimilated by processes of vegetative growth.

Marika Vicari’s research focuses on images of trees and woods reduced to their essence. Through thin, filamentous lines, the artist constructs suspended landscapes, milky surfaces, white forests, and silent scenarios that evoke both a mental and real nature. Works like “Fractures” (2026) and “Traces” (2026) reveal portions of a broader natural order, perceivable only through hints, absences, and traces. Her painting, dry and concise, indirectly highlights ecological themes, transforming the forest into a space of listening, memory, and vulnerability.

Vivere l’estinzione is an exhibition devoid of catastrophic or spectacular images of the end of the world, inviting us to recognize the fragility of the present and the forms of interdependence that bind every living being to the common fate of the Earth. Through painting and sculpture, Roux-Fontaine, Branca, and Vicari give visible form to a complex condition, where the ecological crisis also becomes an opportunity to rethink our way of inhabiting the world.