Michelangelo Pistoletto at the Louvre
       Currently the Italian installation artist is surprising visitors to the great halls of the Louvre, and facing off with the financial powers of the world by using mirrors placed on the famous Louvre Pyramid to protest the world's financial crisis at the hands of financial institutions.  A large stylized infinity symbol can be seen as thousands of guests arrive daily.  Pistoletto began the influential conceptual art movement called 'Arte Povera' which uses poor and everyday materials in art to protest against consumerism.  Louvre visitors experience this newest installation inside the grand halls of statues, and the high ceilinged walls  laden with Renaissance giants, as Pistoletto has hidden mirrors for visitors to see themselves as participants in the great consumerism madness that defines our era.  Perhaps one of Pistoletto's most poignant surprises is Venus and the Rags.  This famous marble statue is all but engulfed in a huge mound of rags and discarded clothing.  

Pistoletto has said of this piece, "It is a metaphor for how all the refuse in the world has cluttered and polluted nature."  Consumerism has replaced beauty.  Venus struggles against modern greed and superficiality.

And yet, for me, (Charlene) perhaps the most glaring "installation" was not presented by Pistoletto.  His influence, however, on me as we made our way through the long halls toward the Mona Lisa, was strikingly apparent.   Mona Lisa's image duplicated by the hundreds greets the onlooker, as phones, cameras, and tablets reach in the air to capture her.  Are they revering her or consuming her?  

   

Are they unwittingly participating with Pistoletto, displaying our modern cultural knack for superficiality?  Perhaps 'Arte Povera' becomes 'Povera Digital' and we are all the less for it.