Artworks Featuring Marble as the Main Element Shine at Milan Exhibition by Objects of Common Interest
During Milan Design Week 2025, the 'Soft Horizons' exhibition, a collaboration between Objects of Common Interest (OoCI) and the Greek Marble Association, took centre stage at the Pasino Glasshouses. This innovative project, part of the collective design showcase Alcova, aimed to shift perceptions of marble, a classical material often associated with heaviness and rigidity.
The exhibition featured a series of marble installations that deconstructed traditional ideas of marble's conventional solidity and permanence. By stacking colours and varying thicknesses, the project explored materiality and texture through layered forms, offering a fresh interpretation of this classical material in a contemporary design context.
The marble used in the exhibition was sourced from quarries across Greece, each piece carrying its own geological story and visual temperament. The natural veining of the marble, formed over time through the layering and compression of various mineral sediments, made each piece entirely unique and a visual record of geological time and transformation.
Greece's marble industry is both rooted in tradition and open to experimentation and contemporary design collaborations. The new brand 'Greek Marble | Then. Now. Forever.' brought together seven marble companies from across Greece, reflecting this balance between the past and the future.
Numerous active quarries across Greece make Greece a key extractor and exporter of marble, equipped with modern techniques. The marble used in the exhibition included Pentelikon marble, known for its fine grain and soft golden hue, marble from Thassos island with crystaline white purity, and Volakas marble with a creamy white base and delicate grey watercolour-like veining.
The project 'Soft Horizons' was a celebration of marble and is part of an Enterprise Greece initiative to promote the material. It also highlighted marble's untapped potential as a sustainable material. The exhibition's designs were embedded in the collective memory of the Greek design duo, who grew up in Greece and see marble as more than just a historical material.
Some of the marble installations hovered or spun above reflective water surfaces, adding an auditory layer to the exhibition, as a sun-like disk, a speaker crafted by Oda, emitted sounds. The project expressed the duality of marble, its groundedness and its almost spiritual presence.
Marble today is entering a more nuanced dialogue, responding to ideas around sustainability, craftsmanship, and sensorial experience. The 'Soft Horizons' exhibition, with its innovative approach to marble, is a testament to this evolving narrative.
The 'Soft Horizons' exhibition, a testament to the evolving narrative of marble, ventured beyond traditional notions, showcasing home-and-garden designs that explored the material's potential as a sustainable and versatile element in modern lifestyle. The diverse collection of marble installations, sourced from various Greek quarries, embodies both the classical heritage and contemporary experimentation of the Greek marble industry.
