IT MEANS PEACE art installation unveils in Milan

Italian fine jewelry brand Pasquale Bruni has been celebrating the handcrafted excellence of unmistakable design for more than 50 years. Each collection is made by hand in the Valenza atelier, where the quest for timeless elegance takes shape in a piece of jewelry. Each creation embodies the brand's DNA, enhancing exclusive designs, unique pavé and carefully selected colored gems to convey the family's passion in exceptional jewelry.

Today, the creative direction of the company is in the hands of Eugenia Bruni, daughter of founder Pasquale Bruni. Educated at the Academy of Art, with a specialization in Goldsmith's Art, Eugenia grew up in the family atelier where, working closely with her father whom she called “the architect of jewelry,” she learned in the field the methods and techniques of the oldest and most prestigious goldsmith's craft. Her sources of inspiration are the feminine universe and nature, fueled by the energy of gems and their colors.

Eugenia Bruni has decided to join Marco Balich in the project It means peace, which expresses the common and profound attention to values such as peace, love, beauty, respect and sustainability. The installation is a space of intense support for the value of peace starting from the word itself through voices, light and symbolism, a perfect space of meaning in which Pasquale Bruni's Ghirlanda Collection lives in the union of meaning with the whole. The lotus flower symbol of rebirth blossoms from a dark earth in search of light and in that light everything is wonder, a breath of peace in the heart.

​It means Peace
‘I enthusiastically accepted Gilda Bojardi's proposal to create a ‘declaration of peace’ at a time in history when the word ‘war’ inhabits our days with increasing intensity,’ says Marco Balich, Creative Director and Chairman of Balich Wonder Studio. ‘It is a difficult time for peace not only globally, but I believe also in our daily lives. Aggression is experienced at every level, directly or indirectly, just listen to the news on the news or scroll through social media timelines. We need to dismantle this aggression from the ground up and choose peace through action, a personal and collective path that requires courage and perseverance. And through my experience, I have learnt that to get a reaction from people, you have to provoke them first.
This is why the installation ‘It means Peace’ begins by generating a feeling of unease: a dark bottleneck, inhabited by sounds and voices that make one imagine a war scenario. It is an emotional journey that symbolically transforms a moment of passage into a reflection and, at the same time, reaches everyone. My way of communicating is always broad, generous, comprehensible because I am interested in reaching as many people as possible.
At the end of this bottleneck is a space of light and harmony, represented by an olive tree, a universal icon of peace and balance, a tangible sign of a goal achieved. The path then continues with very large neon signs bearing the word peace in different languages; we chose seven, like the colours of the flag of peace - Arabic, Hebrew, Russian, Ukrainian, Hindi, Chinese and Japanese. And finally, a kind of ritual that also recalls the theme of Cre-Action; below the inscriptions, in fact, there are pools with floating lotus flowers, inspired by the jewellery of Pasquale Bruni, who made this work possible, where people are invited to light candles and leave messages of peace. The aim is clearly to embrace the word peace, to reintroduce it into our everyday language and turn it into action.
At Balich Wonder Studio we deal with big events, but I would rather say we create experiences. All the projects we create have in common the desire to generate emotions, convey messages and values, bring a space of meaning to life and open up for reflection. Think of the Tree of Life that we created for Expo 2015: was it an event? It was an object that invited people to live an experience and be moved by the emotions it aroused. Designing experiences is our focus: the results can be installations, shows or paths. To experience beauty, to experience harmony and joy, to stimulate reflection, to leave a legacy. This is my way of dismantling hatred, aggression and nurturing the action of peace'.
Marco Balich