Thierry de Cordier's 'NADA' Exhibition at Fondazione Prada Milan

Fondazione Prada in Milan will host a major exhibition dedicated to Belgian artist Thierry de Cordier from April 2025. The show transforms the Cisterna space into a sacred environment, presenting works from his ongoing research on 'nothingness' (NADA) initiated in 1999. De Cordier, born in Ronse in 1954, describes himself as a thinker but operates as a poet-philosopher through visual arts. His practice explores nature, solitude, and the sacred, drawing inspiration from Chinese topographic prints of the 17th and 18th centuries and Nordic landscape views. The exhibition features large nearly monochrome black canvases where the traditional INRI inscription is replaced by NADA, arranged in imposing triptychs. De Cordier's reflection on the sacred, particularly his attempt to understand God's essence through calligraphic works, underpins the project. The artist cites a passage from the biography of Spanish mystic Saint John of the Cross about 'NADA' (nothingness) as a key influence: 'No emphasis, only absolute rigor. The annihilation of oneself to know the only true reality...' The exhibition aims to symbolically surpass Christian iconography by annihilating the meaning of the Crucifixion.