La Bagnante by Sandro Chia at the Scoglio della Regina
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La Bagnante by Sandro Chia at the Scoglio della Regina

Contemporary architecture by the sea

La Bagnante, is a site-specific bronze sculpture created in 2016 by the artist Sandro Chia for the renovation of the Scoglio della Regina, on the promenade between the Cantieri Orlando boatyard and Terrazza Mascagni, which is now a university campus.  The sculpture, a flowing new interpretation of classic forms, restores the missing figure of the queen, transformed into a woman and bather,  who soars towards the sea from the top of the pre-existing ziggurat.  

The work belongs to the formal, constituent research of Sandro Chia, an internationally-renowned artist, starting with the experience of a group of Italian Transavantgarde artists, whose work has always been characterised by pictorial and sculpting research into archaism, classicism and formal, chromatic renewal.    The statue is located in the centre of a small square that juts out over the sea. Its context, recently renovated and extended (2014) by the architect Adriano Podenzana, has a highly contemporary taste.  

"The recovered square, with its inescapable presence of the sky and infinite sea, the viewing tower, the pavement for walking down to the water, all recreate “a metaphysical charm that is not new for the Livorno people, as they are similar sensations that they feel walking on the Terrazza Mascagni, but which will make visitors feel as if they are suspended beyond time. It is that charm that will be primarily hinted at and then expanded by the set of buildings, the old part and the new part of Palazzo dello Scoglio” (source: Il Tirreno Livorno, 17 June 2014) 

The Scoglio della Regina is now a research and logistics centre, the marine robotics centre and the inter-university marine biology centre for Sant’Anna, the Harbourmaster and Lamma.