UGO RIVA – RELIC: A TRIBUTE TO SIMONE MARTINI

The iconography of this sculpture is inspired by the subject of the Madonna and Child. It is probably one of the most popular iconographies in the history of both Western and Eastern art. The Madonna and Child appears since the dawn of medieval art and remained a constant subject as long as religious themes dominated artistic production (that is, until the 19th century, when themes inspired by everyday life began to be introduced). In this case, we have a typical Gothic-Renaissance interpretation.

Throughout his career, Ugo Riva's research has been directed at recovering the art of the past and reinterpreting it with a contemporary sensibility. In particular, Riva has always held classical Greek and Roman art as a model. In this Madonna and Child, however, one can see how Riva's citations have no pre-established boundaries and can also draw on medieval art. The statue in question, in fact, displays a certain Gothic sensibility (declared in the dedication to Simone Martini), especially in the shape of the cusped throne and the taut curvilinear movement that characterizes the sculptural group. However, the monumental proportions and the ample drapery also hark back to fifteenth-century Renaissance sculpture. Furthermore, Riva does not fail to reconfigure his model, applying his own personal poetics of the "unfinished," leaving the statue's surface rough.

Ugo Riva, a sculptor from Bergamo, has always favored figurative art throughout his career. Starting with a study of ancient classicism, he developed a masterful technique in the naturalistic rendering of subjects and anatomical precision. His attention later shifted to contemporary sculptors such as Manzù, Arturo Martini, and Marino Marini, developing a quest for expressionist values ​​and a poetics of the "unfinished."

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