It is an autumn full of inspiration, brought to you by 24 ORE Cultura, which awaits visitors at Mudec – Museum of Cultures in Milan with three exhibitions.
Until 2 November 2025, MUDEC in Milan will present, together with Deutsche Bank and in collaboration with 24 ORE Cultura, the exhibition Borrowed Light by Indian artist Rohini Devasher, winner in 2024 of the prestigious international "Artist of the Year" award that the Bank dedicates to contemporary art. The exhibition is curated by Britta Färber, Global Head of Art & Culture at Deutsche Bank, and represents the artist's first solo exhibition in an Italian institution.
For the fourth consecutive year, the "Artist of the Year" award returns to MUDEC in Milan, consolidating the significant collaboration between Deutsche Bank and 24 ORE Cultura, born in 2022 and based on a common focus to contemporary languages and topics.
For 2024, the "Artist of the Year" is Rohini Devasher (New Delhi, 1978), the first Indian artist to receive this award. An amateur astronomer as well as an artist, for years she has been carrying out a research practice that explores the intersections between art, science and philosophy, developing projects that bring visual culture, technology and scientific knowledge into dialogue.
Central to his work is the observation of the sky: an ancient and universal gesture that Devasher investigates both from a scientific point of view – through tools and data – and as a cultural and philosophical experience, according to a perspective rooted in the Indian tradition.
This long research, together with the themes and questions that animate it, flows into the exhibition Borrowed Light, which highlights his long-standing commitment to the field of astronomy, where light plays a fundamental role not only as a physical phenomenon but as a real visible trace of the passing of time.
The exhibition M.C. Escher. Between Art and Science at MUDEC in Milan will remain open until February 8, 2026 and it marks the return of one of the 20th century's most captivating and iconic artists, Maurits Cornelis Escher (Holland, 1898-1972), to Milan after a decade.
Through an exhibition project entirely dedicated to him, the exhibition offers a new look at his artistic career.
Known for his impossible architectures, optical illusions, tessellations, and metamorphoses, M.C. Escher has created a distinctive visual language that fuses art with mathematics. This mathematics is not composed of the abstract reasoning of professional academics, but is instead born of a lengthy, meticulous, and passionate effort, rooted in a more intuitive and perceptual approach.
Escher's creations blend art and science with a disciplined, inventive, and intensely personal perspective, creating a unifying theme that distinctly marks the exhibition.
With a new look, M.C. Escher. Between Art and Science also investigates the influence of Islamic art – in particular the decorations of the Alhambra in Granada and the Mezquita in Cordoba – in the construction of the graphic universe that characterises the distinctive style of the Dutch artist.
Finally, the exhibition centres on Escher, who integrated this 'graphic universe' into his stylistic identity, even throughout his wide-ranging commercial work. The exhibition showcases how Escher's remarkable talent was applied to different realms of graphic design. Throughout his professional life, the artist created not only artistic prints on loose sheets but also illustrations, book and magazine covers, ex libris, greeting cards, decorative patterns for gift paper, textiles, banknotes, and other items. Commissioned works have never represented a minor parenthesis for the artist, but a fertile ground for refining his visual language.
Produced by 24 ORE Cultura – Gruppo 24 ORE and promoted by the Municipality of Milano-Cultura with the support of Turisanda1924 – exclusive travel brand part of Alpitour World – the exhibition is in collaboration with the Kunstmuseum Den Haag and made possible thanks to M.C. Escher Foundation. Thanks to this valuable collaboration, it is indeed possible to admire in a single exhibition the important works from the permanent collection of the Dutch museum, which houses the largest public museum collection of M.C. Escher in the world, of which we find a significant representation on display.
Finally, on November 12, 2025, will be inaugurated the new installation by Chiharu Shiota, The Moment the Snow Melts, curated by Sara Rizzo, that precedes the exhibition on the theme of snow, which will open at the museum in February 2026.
This is the fourth site-specific contemporary art installation hosted in the Agora, the large glass space on the first floor of MUDEC, designed by David Chipperfield Architects.
Chiharu Shiota (born in 1972), an internationally renowned artist who represented Japan at the Venice Biennale in 2015, continues her research around universal themes of humanity, such as loss and the inevitable passage of time. The installation “The Moment the Snow Melts” represents a moment suspended in time, a metaphorical landscape composed of countless threads (an iconic feature of her work): relationships and moments that dissolve like snow at the end of winter. In this space for reflection, paper is the trace of something or someone vanished in time, but not forgotten.
To learn more, visit https://www.mudec.it/