Michelangelo Pistoletto is the only surviving founder of Arte Povera. Born in Biella, Italy, in 1933, he turned ninety last year, yet continues to travel and work around the world with undiminished energy. In a single sweep, he mounted major solo exhibitions at eight different spaces operated by Galleria Continua. The Arte Povera he initiated does not mean being literally “dirt poor.” Rather, he used the cheapest, most ordinary materials—old clothes, corrugated cardboard, glass, stone, and soap—to make art, stripping away the label of “high culture” that art is so often made to carry.

Michelangelo Pistoletto, installation view of the solo exhibition “Division and Multiplication of the Mirror,” MoMA, United States, 1988. Image courtesy of the MoMA website. Michelangelo Pistoletto, Venus of the Rags, Piazza Municipio, Naples, 2023. Image courtesy of the City of Naples. The Arte Povera work for which he is best known to Chinese audiences is Venus of the Rags, a white Venus sculpture standing before a heap of brightly colored used clothing.

His career spans more than sixty years. He has participated in the Venice Biennale eleven times and received the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement from the Venice Biennale in 2003. His work is held by the world’s most prominent museums and art institutions. Michelangelo Pistoletto and his Mirror Paintings. Michelangelo Pistoletto, Twenty-Two Minus Two, installation view at the Venice Biennale, 2009. The Mirror Paintings—in which he “takes selfies” on the artwork and wields a large hammer against a mirror—became an artistic language that ran through his life.

To celebrate his ninetieth birthday, Galleria Continua organized exhibitions across its eight spaces around the world, looking back at the artist’s work from its beginnings to the present and at the high points of his career. Beijing was the sixth stop. We spoke with Pistoletto himself and with Lorenzo Fiaschi, a partner at Galleria Continua who has worked with him for thirty years, about his unusually long artistic life and his philosophy of living.

Michelangelo Pistoletto, installation view of the solo exhibition “QR Code ‘Speaks,’” Galleria Continua Beijing, 2023. Photograph by Dong Lin. Lorenzo Fiaschi, one of Galleria Continua’s partners, spoke with Yit about the exhibition. Entering the main gallery on the first floor of Galleria Continua Beijing, one finds four white walls beneath a concrete vault, covered with twenty painted QR codes that Pistoletto created especially for the space. The exhibition’s title echoes exactly what greets visitors at the entrance: “QR Code ‘Speaks.’”

What, exactly, do the QR codes say?

“We can appreciate the QR codes as abstract paintings, or scan them directly with a phone and watch, on the screen, twenty selected conversations the artist held over the course of nearly a year with leading figures in chemistry, physics, medicine, philosophy, religion, politics, economics, aviation, and other fields, discussing the importance of art in society,” Lorenzo told us. Michelangelo Pistoletto, installation view of the solo exhibition “QR Code ‘Speaks,’” Galleria Continua Beijing, 2023. Photograph by Dong Lin. The artist and The Formula of Creation. At the center of the conversation held on December 21, 2022, was The Formula of Creation, a new book that took the artist twenty-two years to write. In it, Pistoletto discusses technology, philosophy, art, religion, and other subjects, making it almost an “encyclopedia.”

“In the different conversations, you can hear different methods and see people from different fields working together. To give an example: if you have one idea and I have another, we do not need to argue about ‘whose idea is better.’ We can combine the ideas and create something new—just as in painting, when you mix blue and yellow and get green. Through the series of conversations, the artist also hopes we will understand why the world is beautiful because of difference, and united because of difference.”

“Lorenzo said. QR codes that can be appreciated as abstract paintings. After scanning the QR code with a phone, an interview with the artist about The Formula of Creation appears. The appearance of a work associated with new-media art in the Beijing space surprised me. Pistoletto and Roy Lichtenstein were friends of the same generation, having grown up in an era when new-media art did not yet exist. To us, he seems like the quintessentially old-school European artist.

What does working with new technology mean to him? I asked about his view of the idea that “science and technology must be allowed to run out of control.”

“I want to know: in whose hands has technology run out of control? There are always people who want things to remain stagnant. Modern art, too, was born out of ‘losing control.’ Some people are afraid that robots will replace us, but we should thank robots, because they help us understand how we were created and recognize that we possess certain abilities—we can think, replicate, and depict. So AI is a mirror of technology, one that allows human beings to see themselves,” Pistoletto said.

Michelangelo Pistoletto, installation view of the solo exhibition “QR Code ‘Speaks,’” Galleria Continua Beijing, 2023. Photograph by Dong Lin. The “mirror” Pistoletto mentions is the most important element running through his career, symbolizing its beginning, development, and continuation. In the side gallery on the first floor and the exhibition space on the second, we saw how the mirror changed continually in his work from 1975 to 2023.

“For me, the mirror is infinite, like the universe,” the artist told us. In Arrow, a mirror is pressed flush against the wall, with a solid wooden arrow pointing straight at its surface from below. An arrow suggests dynamic movement, but when it points toward a mirror, its reflection faces the actual arrow and everything comes to a standstill—a form of intensely contradictory black humor. Michelangelo Pistoletto, installation view of the solo exhibition “QR Code ‘Speaks,’” Galleria Continua Beijing, 2023. Photograph by Dong Lin. Michelangelo Pistoletto, installation view of the solo exhibition “QR Code ‘Speaks,’” Galleria Continua Beijing, 2023. Photograph by Dong Lin. Another group of signature Mirror Paintings functions as Pistoletto’s “self-portrait”: he screen-prints recent photographs of himself onto mirrors. When we photograph ourselves in front of the artwork, we obtain a picture with him and become part of the artwork at the same time.

“To a certain extent, Pistoletto invented the selfie. Imagine that in the 1960s, if you had an artwork and wanted to photograph it, you would see your own image appear in this work made of mirrors. How extraordinary that was,” Lorenzo said. Michelangelo Pistoletto, installation view of the solo exhibition “Mirror Paintings I Quadri Specchianti,” Galleria Continua San Gimignano, 2023. Photograph by Ela Bialkowska, OKNO Studio. This was connected to the artist’s early search for his own identity.

“I was looking for my identity: Who am I? What am I doing? I needed a mirror to see myself clearly, and then I gradually realized that what I was looking for was that kind of mirror,” Pistoletto said. Early on, he painted his own image onto mirrors. Later, he began printing photographic images; later still, he stopped restricting the figures to himself. His Mirror Paintings include a bewildered office worker, a woman seen from behind in solitude, a harmonious family of three, dancers moving freely…

Michelangelo Pistoletto, retrospective at Blenheim Palace, United Kingdom, 2017, with the artist and his Mirror Paintings series. Michelangelo Pistoletto, installation view of the solo exhibition “QR Code ‘Speaks,’” Galleria Continua Beijing, 2023. Photograph by Dong Lin. Pistoletto chose to use a camera to record vivid fragments of his time and fix those traces permanently on the mirror’s surface. Thus, whenever we pass works from different periods in the Mirror Paintings series, we sense an expansive experience of time and space: our reflections are the present, the real, always in motion; the figures in the mirror belong to the past, have vanished, and yet have been stilled.

“For Pistoletto, what matters is not the mirror itself but the changes taking place within it. It tells the story of the transformation of society, containing the past, the present, and the future. In the mirror, we see not only ourselves but other people as well. In that sense, the mirror is like a universe. We are all in this universe, searching for a harmonious way to coexist,” Lorenzo told us. After Twenty-Two Minus Two in Venice in 2009, Pistoletto made a series of works in which he broke mirrors. This one, Thirteen Minus One, was shown at Galleria Continua’s Havana space in 2015. Michelangelo Pistoletto, On the Mirror, Galleria Continua Beijing, 2018. Apart from intact Mirror Paintings, Pistoletto once wielded a large wooden mallet at the opening of the 59th Venice Biennale in 2009, smashing twenty-two complete, monumental mirrors in the main pavilion.

On-site, the sound of the enormous mirrors shattering, together with the stunned crowd, produced a kind of tableau. From then on, “breaking the mirror” became another signature extension of his Mirror Paintings. Michelangelo Pistoletto, installation view of the solo exhibition “Color and Light,” Galleria Continua Rome, 2023. Photograph by Giorgio Benni. In the Rome space of this traveling exhibition, the Mirror Paintings simulate mirrors that have been broken and peeled away, revealing multicolored surfaces beneath.

“The breaking of a mirror can be interpreted in several ways. One belongs to the realm of superstition: the idea that a broken mirror brings bad luck continues to frighten people. Therefore, breaking a mirror means breaking superstition,” he said. Michelangelo Pistoletto and The Well, a work made of corrugated cardboard. Michelangelo Pistoletto, retrospective at Blenheim Palace, United Kingdom, 2017. Michelangelo Pistoletto, installation view of the solo exhibition “Love Differences,” Galleria Continua Havana, 2023. Photograph by Nestor Kim. If the Mirror Paintings form the foundation of everything in Pistoletto’s artistic career, then the series Minus Objects, which he began exploring in 1965, marked the dramatic arrival of Arte Povera.

Among them is the familiar Venus of the Rags. Pistoletto placed a white Venus sculpture beside a large pile of brightly colored used clothes. We see only Venus’s back; her face is buried deep in the garments, producing a powerful visual impact. Michelangelo Pistoletto, installation view of the solo exhibition “A Year—Paradise on Earth,” the Louvre, Paris, France, 2013. The “mirror box” at center is the first version of Infinite Square Meter. Michelangelo Pistoletto, installation view of the solo exhibition “QR Code ‘Speaks,’” Galleria Continua Beijing, 2023. Photograph by Dong Lin. Infinite Square Meter, 1966–2021. Another representative work of Arte Povera shown here, Infinite Square Meter, began with an early prototype: the artist used twine to bind mirrors back-to-back into a cubic-meter “mirror box.”

All the reflected images remained inside the “box,” making the image, for the viewer, effectively nonexistent—something imagined. The Infinite Square Meter on view here is the form the series took after fifty-five years of development: the “mirror box” opens outward in a more expansive configuration before us, and the image that once existed only in the imagination becomes a kind of reality. Michelangelo Pistoletto, retrospective at Blenheim Palace, United Kingdom, 2017. Michelangelo Pistoletto, installation view of the solo exhibition “Symbol—Art Segno Arte,” Galleria Continua Paris, 2023. Photograph by Ela Bialkowska, OKNO Studio. Pistoletto’s decision to initiate the Arte Povera movement was closely tied to his adolescence and education.

Pistoletto’s father was a traditional oil-painting restorer, while his mother favored more avant-garde popular art. The atmosphere at home was steeped in art, and masterpieces of classical painting were often within view. Michelangelo Pistoletto, installation view of the solo exhibition “Love Differences,” Galleria Continua Havana, 2023. Photograph by Nestor Kim. Michelangelo Pistoletto, Newspaper Sphere (Museum Project), 1966–2019. Photograph by Allison Borgo. Michelangelo Pistoletto, retrospective at Blenheim Palace, United Kingdom, 2017. Because he grew up amid the violence of the Second World War and once saw prisoners executed in the street, art was, for him, more like a guiding light in a turbulent, oppressive life, a remedy for emotional distress, and a daily necessity that allowed him to think deeply—not an elevated taste for refined aesthetics.

His family also sent him to a school of advertising design in the hope of securing a stable future for him. There he encountered more avant-garde ideas. The startling artistic positions and works we have seen grew from the earliest “roots” planted during those formative experiences. Michelangelo Pistoletto, The Third Paradise, Forest of Saint Francis, 2010. Michelangelo Pistoletto, installation view of the solo exhibition “A Year—Paradise on Earth,” the Louvre, Paris, France, 2013. In Pistoletto’s current artistic thinking, “infinity” is an essential part.

“Why do we talk about infinity? Because life exists within infinity. I saw infinity in the Mirror Paintings. I had been looking for a symbol that could represent the infinity I saw in the Mirror Paintings,” Pistoletto said. This insistence on pursuing “infinity” led him to create the symbol of the Third Paradise. It is a simple form: a large circle in the middle joined to two smaller circles at either end, derived from the infinity symbol.

Michelangelo Pistoletto, The Third Paradise, 2019. Photograph by Andrea Rossetti. The first Third Paradise symbol Pistoletto drew in the sand, 2003. Photograph by J.E.S. Since Pistoletto drew the first Third Paradise symbol on a beach in 2003, it has spread across famous interiors and outdoor landscapes in cities throughout Europe, the Americas, and Asia.

He hopes to cover every corner of the globe with this “new dimension of human coexistence.” Michelangelo Pistoletto, installation view of the solo exhibition “Chance IL CASO,” 2023. Galleria Continua, in collaboration with the São Paulo Institute of Culture and Art. Photograph by Joao Caldas. When we asked how to understand the highly abstract concept of the Third Paradise, he said, “The large circle in the middle is ‘chance.’”

“It is like a soccer field: each of the two smaller circles contains a team, and the soccer ball placed in the center is ‘chance.’ Both teams devote as much force, will, strategy, and intelligence as they can from every angle, each trying to bring ‘chance’ where it wants it to go.”

“‘Chance’ is what brings the two teams together and produces a match. The teams are not enemies but friends, because without each other the match could not take place.” Michelangelo Pistoletto, retrospective at Blenheim Palace, United Kingdom, 2017. Michelangelo Pistoletto, installation view of the solo exhibition “QR Code ‘Speaks,’” Galleria Continua Beijing, 2023. Photograph by Dong Lin. The artist’s hope is that people who work deeply in different fields, whenever and under whatever conditions they encounter one another, can accept and accommodate each other’s differences, cooperate peacefully as friends, and advance or create newer ideas and a better world.

On the third floor, the artist’s famous series of red-and-blue neon works offers a simple, unadorned interpretation of his Third Paradise philosophy—“Love Differences”—elevating the exhibition’s theme once again. Michelangelo Pistoletto, installation view of the solo exhibition “The Time of Judgment IL TEMPO DEL GIUDIZIO,” Galleria Continua Dubai, 2023. Photograph by Musthafa Aboobaker. The artist’s eight-stop traveling exhibition was, in effect, Galleria Continua’s ninetieth-birthday gift to Pistoletto, with each space offering a distinct theme.

“In the Beijing space, we have the ‘QR codes’; in Dubai, the theme concerns religion; in France, we talk about humanity; in Italy, we return to the beginning of his career and answer why he uses mirrors; in Brazil, we are carrying out the Third Paradise project…” Lorenzo told us. Michelangelo Pistoletto, installation view of the solo exhibition “QR Code ‘Speaks,’” Galleria Continua Beijing, 2023. Photograph by Dong Lin. “Pistoletto is ninety this year, but in my eyes he is still very young.

I have known him for thirty years. To me, Pistoletto is not a colleague, and he is not a friend. He is simply himself—consistent and always genuine.”

“He is always full of energy, and that energy has taught me to accept every difference. It has also helped me understand many things in life: the world is a universe, and to survive in this universe, we must find some harmonious way to coexist.” At the end of the interview, Lorenzo could not conceal his admiration for the great artist.