Break the Mold
Break the Mold is a sculptural lighting project rooted in Jenna Basso Pietrobon’s family history in the ceramic and lighting industries. Inspired by her upbringing in her father and grandparents’ factory, the project reflects on dismantling and rebuilding—of the body, of heritage, and of place. After her grandparents emigrated from Italy in the 1950s, their craft sustained a new life in Canada. Decades later, the artist returned to Nove di Bassano, their hometown and a historic ceramic center, to reconnect with that lineage.
Working inside her cousin’s shuttered ceramics factory, she reactivates abandoned plaster molds—objects once used for industrial repetition—distorting and recombining them into singular sculptural forms. Removed prematurely from the casting process, the clay remains soft and unstable, allowing each work to be pushed, collapsed, and reformed. Imperfection becomes structure; collapse becomes a generative act.
Break the Mold operates not as a fixed collection of objects, but as an evolving sculptural system. From a finite set of historic molds, thousands of unique works can be produced through processes of collage, deformation, and recomposition. The project functions simultaneously as archive, production site, and installation—collapsing distinctions between craft, design, and sculpture. In this way, the work proposes a shift from object-making toward a living, generative language of form.
A portion of proceeds supports The Fondamenta, an initiative dedicated to revitalizing Nove’s ceramic economy, preserving local knowledge, and creating opportunities for artisans and future generations.
The Lamp Lady, performance, Milan / Venice, 2022–
A lampshade worn as a head and a light held in the hand, the body becomes a moving fixture—activating ceramic forms through gesture and public encounter, in a Dada-inflected inversion of object and figure. Moving through Venice from sunset into darkness, the work unfolds in time, shifting with the changing light of the city. The system extends beyond objects into the body.
Duration: 3 hours 20 minutes
Clip location: Giardini della Biennale
Duration: 3 hours, 40 minutes
Clip location: Bar Basso
Duration: 3 hours, 10 minutes
Clip location: Brera