Provocative, symbolic, and visceral are some of the adjectives that define the works of creative-destructive Maurizio Cattelan, who is currently presenting a new series of works at Gagosian Gallery in London.

The exhibition, titled Bones, consists of a series of gold panels, a sculpture with horns on an armchair, and a friendly skeleton playing the guitar inside a bottle.

Deaf, by Maurizio Cattelan (2025)

Bones, Gagosian Gallery

Notre Dame, by Maurizio Cattelan (2025)

The gilded panels were "modified" with one or two gunshots. These surfaces represent Cattelan's usual metaphorical demonstration of creation-destruction. The violence of the marks on the gilding (apparently a surface with a minimal layer of 24-karat gold) is such that it shocks the visitor, who tries to find a connection with the torn canvases of Lucio Fontana (Argentina, Rosario, 1899 - Italy, Comabbio, 1968). However, Fontana's work was avant-garde, while Cattelan's is savage. 

The imposing sculpture Notre Dame was placed by the window of the gallery, It’s a  marble carved into the shape of a bull's head with horns and it reflects the tension between the natural and the imagined. The mythic aspect of this piece, which would represent a fossilized deity whose forms bear the seal of power and virility, cannot be denied. Finally Deaf, the absurd figure of a skeleton enclosed in a very small bottle that paradoxically was placed on a pedestal and is displayed alone in an isolated room, very Cattelan!