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Mappa, 1989–90, Embroidery, 116x178 cm ©Private Collection Modena/SIAE 2024

In his artistic practice, composite, vast, always brilliant, he These kaleidoscopic needle (Afghan or Pakistani) and thread
imagines and represents a world without boundaries. He summa- (European) geometries, seethe in constant transformation. This
rizes this thought clearly in the tapestry cycle devoted to maps. is the time for embroideries that the artist, simple and direct,
The geographical shape of every country in the world is entitled Tutto “Everything”: silhouettes that fit seamlessly into
accurately traced, each delineated territory sporting the livery one another. Every imaginable thing is present: a telephone stands
of the corresponding flag. Drawing ‘the political planisphere’ out next to a pony, green glasses and a lighter, keys and the peace
divided into nations is only an apparent contradiction. symbol, a bicycle and a little man in silhouette.
Boetti’s intention was the opposite, by no means to single out A glowing colorful world where everything depicted is as
and divide peoples, rather, it is a call to invite them to celebrate if it were there for us, belonging to us, but, mind you, not out
art and life, by waving, all together, this colorful and festive ‘great of greed, but out of the generosity of being able to share it.
country’, bathed by an ocean that is sometimes pink, sometimes An explosion of horror vacui that does not frighten us and
silver or blue. An ocean that takes all the chromatic shades we understand why immediately: the tapestry is singing a
released by the imagination. universal love song to us.

Protagonist Art 27