Diomira
This is one of three works from Rua’s series inspired by Italo Calvino’s 1972 novel, Invisible Cities, which finds Marco Polo speaking to Kublai Khan about his travels throughout the wondrous and surreal cities under the Khan’s possession. Visualizing these imaginative cities using Marco Polo’s descriptions, Rua has created a series of color pencil works on paper that portray the special qualities of each environment.
In Diomira, a city formed by “sixty silver domes”, we see streets paved with lead and a night sky that is lit up by the many multi-colored lamps that line the doors of food stalls. In the geometric and warped perspective of this work, we are presented an abstracted version of this dynamic city, distinguished by its symmetrical nature.
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