Santi is excited to present Muriella, Edoardo Rito’s debut solo exhibition and the gallery’s inaugural show, with an accompanying text by Marina Seyffert.

Muriella is a regional Italian word from Tuscany, first encountered by Rito in In Tralice Al Tempo (1932), a poetry collection by his great-grandfather, Alberto Caligiani. Poesia IX reflects on a tranquil morning in the countryside town of Montemurlo, where the renewal of nature stirs a sense of inner peace and nostalgia, culminating in the joyful return of village children playing muriella. The term refers both to a small stone or tile traditionally used in children’s street games and to the games themselves—improvised and played with readily available materials.

Rito engages in a similar form of playfulness in his practice, assembling a collection of found objects gathered from the streets of London. Discarded materials—shattered glass, wooden roll-up blinds, marble fragments—are brought into the studio, where he examines and experiments with them. His process is driven by an intuitive engagement with these objects, where collecting and playing are not merely preparatory steps but fundamental gestures shaping his work.

Three distinct yet intertwined series are presented in this exhibition. The Sunset series, displayed in the first room, began with a high school astrology book. Rito excised an image of a sunset, cutting it into strips and rearranging them on paper.

In the corridor room, Riverbed 3 unfolds—an ongoing series of installations initiated in August last year. Riverbed 3 is constructed on a wooden base, framed with stainless steel, and elevated using base jacks. Rito layers the boards with a mixture of cement powder and black sand, embedding shattered glass without purification or cleaning, creating a veiled interplay of found objects and materials. The act of concealment and revelation becomes central to the series, evoking the stratified accumulation of detritus in a natural riverbed.

Lastly, the third room houses a newly developed body of work, emerging as a response to Riverbed 3. The Silt Units originated through an almost archaeological process—Rito excavated wooden fragments, metal pieces, stones, and small objects from the very boxes that once contained the shattered glass used in Riverbed 3. These fragments, accidentally collected, are then recombined with other street-found and studio materials, which he displays on chipboards or inside old screw boxes filled with cement powder. Two square boxes literalise this collection of Silt Units, the ephemerality of such processes underscored by their cardboard materiality.

EDOARDO RITO (B. 1999)
Edoardo Rito was born in Florence, Italy, in 1999 and currently lives and works in London. Rito completed his BFA at UAL Chelsea College of Arts in 2021 and earned his MA in Fine Art from UAL Central Saint Martins in 2024. His recent and forthcoming exhibitions include the Sixi International Artist-In-Residence program in Nanjing (2025); Le Nuvole vanno e vengono, sembrano animali, ma li vedono solo i bambini at HartsLane, London (2024); and Silent Betwixt at Guts Projects, London (2024).

→ Press Release (PDF)
→ Accompanying text by Marina Seyffert (PDF)