Hasta La Ideas

From runways to galleries, the philosophical needlework of a rising Italian artist

Aldo Lanzini‘s beautifully alarming crochet masks most recently made an appearance at Missoni’s Spring/Summer 2011 fashion show when the 30 ushers wore them to seat people. While the riotous colors and fantastical faces make compliment the Italian label’s renowned knitwear well, their bold expressions and strange forms of the maskes are a spectacle of their own.

Splitting his time between Milan and NYC for the past 15 years, Lanzini has been quietly building a large army of loud characters with his expressive needlework, explaining to Vogue Italia that his pieces are “the condition of contemporary man, some kind of conscious schizophrenia.”

Lanzini’s work can currently be seen at Milan’s Le Case D’Arte, where he transformed the gallery into visceral experience that amplifies the senses through visual, sonorous, tactile and olfactory elements. Dubbed “The Drop,” the exhibition speaks to Lanzini’s constant investigation of how the process of creation affects the everyday life and is on view through 11 December 2010.