Mazzolari’s champion for The Wick is the artist’s regular collaborator Ilaria Martello: “I met Carolina in 2012 at the Royal Ballet when she was developing textiles for the Machina costumes, one of the three ballets commissioned as part of Metamorphosis: Titian 2012 in response to three Titian paintings. Our first encounter was fortuitous, but it wasn’t until years later when I first visited her studio that I realised not only the magic of her work, but also of her world: a cabinet of curiosities where ancient techniques are used as a source of storytelling. Her work re-imagines the complexity of the past through a very contemporary lens and aesthetic.”

Martello, who worked with Mazzolari on Alone, Together, a site-specific video installation presented at the Venice Biennale in 2023, added that: “the colours, the textures, the layers of materials reflect her acute ability to deeply connect with human emotions in a way that is quite hypnotic. One of the things that fascinates me the most is how her work is always mediated by the use of her skilled hands that painstakingly map the journey at a different tempo, making it truly revolutionary in a world measured by speed. I love Carolina’s work for many reasons but particularly for its elegance, the energy it carries and for how it questions the value and the ambiguities of the social dimension of life.”

One of Mazzolari’s ongoing series has been abstract tapestries, depictions of interior landscapes, influenced by the ideas of Jung and Kurt Lewin’s Field Theory. Employing a handstitched herringbone technique – that originated in Ancient Italy, tracing a line to her artistic heritage – with wool, silk and cotton threads, Mazzolari’s works have been likened to mandalas, alluding to their quasi-spiritual effect, getting at deep-rooted and universal human patterns in behaviour and responses.

At the moment, Mazzolari tells The Wick, she is “finishing my largest Line tapestry to date. A particularly significant endeavour has been starting the transition to translating my latest tapestry into a bronze and wood edition, which has pushed me to work with clay and approach the details of the finished piece from a completely different perspective. It has also been a process of trial and error—failing, starting over, and refining multiple times.” This is where Mazzolari gets the most satisfaction and a sense of satisfaction from her work. “Every time I manage to advance technically and visually, it feels like the greatest achievement.”