Sphere Within Sphere (Sfera con sfera) describes a series of spherical bronze sculptures by Italian sculptor Arnaldo Pomodoro. In 1966, Pomodoro was commissioned to create a 3.5-meter sphere for Expo 67 in Montreal. The success of this sculpture propelled Pomodoro's works into the mainstream, allowing for commissions that would land his sculptures at the Headquarters of the United Nations and the Vatican Museums.
Over his career, Pomodoro created 45 of these popular sculptures, aptly named Rotante, Sphera, or Sphera con sphera. The spheres range in size from as small as half a meter up to 4 meters in diameter. They are meant to represent the 'ideal city,' with contrasting imagery of organic and human shapes combined with technological and gear-like components. The spheres can be seen as a promising rebirth of a less troubled and destructive world. Pomodoro described his desire for building these sculptures, stating, "breaking these perfect, magic forms in order to reveal their internal ferment, mysterious and alive, monstrous and yet pure; I [want to] create a discordant tension, a conflict, with the polished shine: a unity composed of incompleteness."
Locations Versions of the sculpture can be found around the world, including:.
Europe Italy: Milan: Cimitero Monumentale Gallerie di Piazza Scala Museo del Novecento Milano Santa Giulia Mario Negri Institute for Pharmacological Research Parma: Collezione Barilla di Arte Moderna Verona: Byblos Art Hotel Venice: Peggy Guggenheim Collection Trieste: Museo Revoltella Florence: Direzione Regionale di Intesa Sanpaolo Pesaro: Piazzale della Libertà Gubbio: Park hotel ai Cappuccini Rome: Ministry of Foreign Affairs (Italy) Galleria Nazionale d'Arte Moderna Hotel Palazzo Ripetta Hilton Rome Airport Vatican City: Vatican Museums Dublin: Eavan Boland Library Rotterdam: Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen Monaco: Quai Jean-Charles Ray Warsaw: Royal Lazienki Museum The Hague<ref><https://www.flickr.com/photos/piet_musterd/4865581766//ref>: central hall of the ministries of Social Affairs and Work and Health, Welfare and Sports
United States Berkeley, California: Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive San Francisco: De Young Museum San Diego: The San Diego Museum of Art Dallas, Texas: Dallas Museum of Art Des Moines, Iowa: Wellabee Headquarters Building Milwaukee, Wisconsin: Milwaukee Art Museum Chicago, Illinois: Art Institute of Chicago Indianapolis, Indiana: Christian Theological Seminary Columbus, Ohio: Columbus Museum of Art Richmond, Virginia: Virginia Museum of Fine Arts Washington, DC: Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Art Museum New York City: Mount Sinai Hospital (Manhattan) Museum of Modern Art United Nations Plaza Worcester, Massachusetts: Worcester Art Museum
Middle East Tel Aviv: Tel Aviv University Jeddah: Jeddah Sculpture Museum Tehran: Tehran Museum of Contemporary Art
Japan Miyazaki: Miyazaki Prefectural Art Museum Hiroshima: Fukuyama Museum of Art Kanagawa: The Hakone Open-Air Museum Amada Co., Ltd. Hokkaido: Kushiro City Museum
References
External links flickr.com