Pietrasanta | MOG

Phallic art has a distinguished history, dating back millennia and extending around the globe. The human race as a whole, however, has appeared more reluctant to embrace the vagina – artistically speaking of course. Not so Morgana Orsetta Ghini, who lives and works in Pietrasanta and positively specializes in ‘that symbol of unsettling mystery, irresistable attraction, recurrent taboo, vital magic, called the vagina’, to quote from her bio. MOG, as she signs her art, is essentially a sculptor who works with bronze, iron and marble (on the Tuscan Rivierashe’s within sight of the Carrara marble quarries), and on to steel, resins, ceramics, precious metals and stones (in sculpture-jewellery), fabrics and even watercolours to express… a clear, unabashed and impassioned approach to femininity.

And MOG thinks big. Monumental marble vulvae, larger-than-life vaginal passages in glossy steel, big vulval cushions, a whole ceramic washbasin in that now familiar form. Only the jewels come close to actual size. If the theme seems a tad repetitive, that hasn’t deterred numerous galleries or curators of exhibitions, some solo, in Milan, Genoa, Bologna and Rome, Palma de Mallorca and Tenerife, and on to the Rosa Parks Museum in Montgomery, Alabama, of all places. MOG-ART is nothing if not impressive.