Fear

The boat ambles up the Grand Canal in Venice, pulling up at the train station at the top of town. From there, I walk to meet the car that will take me north to Vicenza. It’s about a two-hour drive. The driver is very entertaining, and when I’m not asleep, we talk about cars.

I begin the studio tour with a glass of locally made sparkling wine, Cortenera Extra Brut Metodo Clássico. I’m informed this is a regional speciality. The bubbles are very fine, and the dryness suits me. We are sitting on the crates used for transporting Sassolino’s dangers around the world. In an adjacent room, a sheet of stainless steel approximately 1.5 m² is attached to a large electric motor that’s attached to the wall. The light is diffused and very pretty. It’s 20 April. ‘We will go in there later,’ I’m told. At this stage, I’m completely unaware of how much danger that room holds.

Glass dust and fragments, green the colour of freshly watered and manicured grass, cover a corner of the floor directly in front of a heavy piece of cor-ten steel leaning against the white wall. The sheet of steel appears to be waiting to be moved, and the light in the room is bright although filtered through opaque cell-like windows. Across the room, placed on the floor, is a grey steel capsule roughly the size of a washing basket but nothing like a washing basket. I’m informed that the capsule is probably the most dangerous and unstable object on display in this building. I pause and stare at it. I’m staring at a bomb, not an idea of a bomb or a metaphor for a bomb; it’s a bomb. Unexpectedly, I feel a sense of relief when it’s quickly established that there’s no way this bomb can come to Tasmania; there’s too much danger surrounding its transport across the planet. We move on.

An anvil seems to float at around six feet in the air. In fact it’s on a thick sheet of glass that lies across a stainless steel frame. I am still processing the bomb and haven’t yet registered that the anvil on the glass is another source of danger. It’s only when I stop and stare at it that my brain registers the problem. I quickly move from acknowledging that I really don’t know what anvils are used for, to thinking about what would happen if the glass gave way with me lying underneath it. This room is as evenly lit as the previous rooms. The light in Northern Italy at this time of the year is astonishing. And the room is very quiet despite the number of us in it.

Image: violenza casuale, 2008–25, Arcangelo Sassolino
Wood, hydraulic cylinder and electrical system
Courtesy of the artist

On the floor is a large hydraulic ram, with a substantially sized piece of kindling strapped to it via a hefty steel cable. Arcangelo turns on the machine and increases the speed at which the ram is forced against the timber. We only have one day and we still haven’t had lunch, so a more rapid demonstration than usual is required. Fortunately, we can imagine these competing forces in slow motion, and the ever-present sense of danger is also beginning to slow. Until we move into the next room, where we find a large steel box sitting; it is larger than a car and smaller than a truck. Neat weld lines hold the sheets together to make the box. Arcangelo turns on a mechanism that pushes air into this box and, within minutes, it starts to swell uncomfortably. The pump is trying its hardest to overinflate the steel box, and the box in return is resisting the force. It begins to shake, all the sides are bulging, the bottom of the box bulges enough to make the whole thing lift up from the floor, and it’s rocking around making loud, stressful noises. I’m starting to feel danger again. My instinct is to walk closer to the box—I want to feel the stresses come to my body—but my mind keeps my feet from moving forward, seemingly capable only of retreat. I’m dissatisfied with this situation but realise there’s nothing I can do to change it, so I just walk away. This is exciting beyond any studio visit I have ever done; but it’s also way too dangerous here.

Next we enter through a black curtain into the building’s central stairwell. The stairs are in a state of disrepair: under renovation, I guess. But we have to walk up them anyway. Arcangelo and his team have prepared the diplomazija astuta piece for viewing; this is what I came primarily to see. There is a small hole in the concrete ceiling, which molten metal starts to drip through into a same-sized hole in the floor. The glowing metal disappears into nothingness. We envisage the fiery drips hitting a surface, so they spray up in dramatic fashion, something similar to the sparks seen flying out from a welding robot. We have a desire for more industrial theatre. Arcangelo then grabs a piece of steel sheet about 40 cm² square and holds it under the dripping metal to demonstrate that what we’re discussing together is easily achieved. We stand up on the staircase, removing ourselves from danger while watching him create the effect. This space doesn’t appear to be as dangerous as the previous rooms, but that turns out to be just another poorly informed observation, a curator’s specialty. We all agree that this is the way to proceed for the Mona exhibition and we leave the building satisfied.

Image: in the end, the beginning (detail), 2025, Arcangelo Sassolino
Steel, water, induction and electrical system
Courtesy of the artist

Now back at the first building, where that stainless steel sheet mounted to the engine mounted to the wall still sits dormant. We go in with Arcangelo who explains that the overly powerful electric motor will rotate the stainless sheet at very high speed. This feels exciting, it definitely feels dangerous already and nothing is happening yet. I only become concerned when I notice that Arcangelo’s team are outside this room looking at us through the protective glass wall. My fear returns. The motor starts and the steel sheet spins, it’s getting very fast and I’m becoming increasingly anxious about what could happen. Then I feel that enough is enough; and that if the mechanism fails at any point the spinning metal sheet could produce devastating architectural havoc and likely kill or maim some of us. The glass and wall separating the team members from the potential violence now seem nothing if not feeble. At this point, Arcangelo informs us that the motor is only running at 30% of its capability. Now I really want to leave. Fear has set in and being in here feels like a bad plan. The motor winds down and we all leave, slightly euphoric that nobody died. We go to lunch, and it’s spectacular.

When is it possible to learn more about fear than I just have? Did I just spend those few hours embracing our basic human response to danger? As ocean swimmers or surfers know every time they walk into the water, or every passenger who ever boards an aeroplane, the dangers are ever present and our fear is real—but not debilitating. Throughout the development of this exhibition, I’ve talked about danger and risk—and feelings about danger and risk— much more than I usually would. This is the primary point of tension, the problem the artist has given us to solve: how do we feel when we face danger, real or imagined? What is happening in our bodies?

These works by Arcangelo Sassolino at Mona are extremely humanising. They remind us that our emotional response to vulnerability is not a weakness, but rather a fundamental condition of being human. That’s what I learnt about fear.

Header image: the paradoxical nature of life, 2023, Arcangelo Sassolino
Stone, glass and steel
Courtesy of the artist