Rongorongo Earrings – Homage to Alan Watts

Tania Pistone
Rongorongo, 2021
Homage to Alan Watts
18kt gold with bespoke black enamel earrings
1.5 x 10.5 cm
unique and signed

 

Tania Pistone’s wearable art project for the Elisabetta Cipriani Gallery came to life following the artist’s Rongorongo series, paintings which depict an imaginary alphabet on gold-leaf plates. In her Rongorongo paintings, Pistone creates symbols in a deliberate attempt to reach an ideal alphabet, which addresses our shared, collective human unconscious. A place which she believes has been shaped by the experiences of our ancestors.

‘This project was dedicated to Alan Watts, an English philosopher born in (1915 – 1973). His major contribution was given as a popularizer in the West of Eastern philosophies (Zen). In one of his many monologues, there is the one on: what is love, which I used to engrave the plates (obviously it is fragmented into the various jewels), but the intention is that the message they carry is that. I am attaching the text:’ -Pistone (translated from Italian)

Well now really when we go back into falling in love. And say, it′s crazy. Falling. You see? We don’t say “rising into love.” There is in it the idea of the fall. And it goes back, as a matter of fact, to extremely fundamental things. That there is always a curious tie at some point between the fall and the creation. Taking this ghastly risk is the condition of there being life. You see, for all life is an act of faith an act of gamble. The moment you take a step, you do so on an act of faith because you don′t really know that the floor’s not going to give under your feet. The moment you take a journey, what an act of faith. The moment that you enter into any kind of human undertaking in relationship, what an act of faith. See, you’ve given yourself up. But this is the most powerful thing that can be done. Surrender. See. And love is an act of surrender to another person. Total abandonment. I give myself to you. Take me. Do anything you like with me. See. So, that′s quite mad because you see, it′s letting things get out of control. All sensible people keep things in control. Watch it, watch it, watch it. Security? Vigilance? Watch it. Police? Watch it. Guards? Watch it. Who’s going to watch the guards? So, actually, therefore, the course of wisdom, what is really sensible, is to let go, is to commit oneself, to give oneself up and that′s quite mad. So we come to the strange conclusion that in madness lies sanity. – Alan Watts

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