OCULUS OCULI

a PROJECT BY MARCO MILIA

Marco Milia’s artistic process is grounded in a sustained investigation of space, understood as both a perceptual and relational experience. Each work is conceived as a device that activates a dialogue between environment, structure, and viewer. The starting point is often a close analysis of context, whether architectural or natural, from which a site-specific approach emerges. The work is never autonomous but integrated into its surroundings. His practice develops through the use of elementary geometric modules, repeated and combined into complex structures. Modularity becomes a language that evokes natural and scientific systems. Industrial materials such as polycarbonate are chosen for their capacity to interact with light. Light, in this context, is not a secondary element but a primary expressive medium, contributing to the dematerialization of forms and the creation of immersive, dynamic environments.

For Oculus Oculi, Marco Milia develops a study of architectural elements and natural or manufactured structures, gathered through his walks in Istanbul and further explored in his studio in Rome. The final installation, conceived and produced specifically for the exhibition space, brings together a set of forms that evoke, in turn, the dome of a hammam, a honeycomb-like cellular structure, or organic patterns.

Composed of a multitude of geometric units, the structure unfolds as a system poised between construction and visual instability. It draws in the viewer’s gaze, subtly disorients it, and creates a nearly hypnotic experience in which the eye keeps moving without settling. The installation is meant to be experienced physically. As the viewer moves around it, perception shifts and expands beyond the purely visual. The repetition of forms, the play of light, and the changing viewpoints create a sense of balance and imbalance at once, where the work appears constantly in the process of forming and transforming.

Marco Milia lives and works in Rome (IT)