Claudia Comte covers gallery floor with soil from her Basel garden at Vistamare Milan

Swiss artist Claudia Comte (born 1983 in Grancy, now living near Basel) has transformed Vistamare gallery in Milan into a rural oasis by covering the entire floor with soil directly from her garden in Basel. The exhibition features three large wooden sculptures—Francesca, Willy, and Robin—representing a leaf, a coral, and a giant cactus, all carved from a sequoia tree that fell in her garden in 2023. Smaller sculptures are named after friends, relatives, and gallerists; Francesca references Swiss collector Francesca Thyssen. Soil also extends onto the walls in geometric patterns of canvas and wood strips, evoking cave paintings. Comte's work merges biology with digital technology, aiming for a post-human art where organic and digital fuse. Her aesthetic is abstract and minimal, influenced by Sol LeWitt and John Armleder, with a focus on nature's mathematical perfection and resilience against climate change.