Description
A network of white circles expands across the wall like an organic constellation. Large and small circles are connected by chains of tiny rings, creating ramifications reminiscent of the dendrites and axons of the nervous system. The wall sculpture—extremely lightweight despite being made of iron—plays with light and shadow: the laser-cut edges cast subtle shadows on the surface, amplifying the work’s three-dimensional presence.
25-C03 belongs to the Rete Neurale series, works in which Elisa Cella investigates neurons, axons, synapses, and dendrites, asking a question that is both philosophical and scientific: where and what is consciousness? A question we have been trying to answer through philosophy and religion for thousands of years, and which modern neuroscience is still exploring without finding a definitive answer.
The artist finds beauty and elegance in the form of neurons: their branches, their symmetries, the ways they intertwine, the connections through which information passes. The nervous system—more than one hundred billion neurons—processes perceptions, thoughts, emotions, commands, movements, intuitions. Everything we are is there, synecdochely: in the neural connections, in the complex system that is the brain, in the relationships between this enormous quantity of cells and the rest of the body.
