This week we draw inspiration from Giorgio de Chirico, the Italian painter whose metaphysical works like “The Enigma of a Day” (1914) or “The Enigma of the Autumn Afternoon” are worlds of elongated shadows, Roman arcades, and near-empty Italian piazzas, one of the most essential locales of urban life in Italy.

When learning more about this metaphysical painter and what metaphysical means in regard to artwork, I learned De Chirico had a poignant moment one afternoon in the autumn of 1909. He was sitting alone in the afternoon sun of a piazza and he came to understand something important, something profound: he saw behind the appearance of things, behind the actual materials, and he saw everything as deeply healing.

He says of that moment in Meditations of a Painter, “The whole world, down to the marble of the buildings and fountains, seemed to me to be convalescent.” They were healing to him.

Spolia by Opiary appears to fit right into one of De Chirico’s paintings. Switch out the Roman arcades on the left in “Mystery and Melancholy of a Street” (1914) for this biophilia wall.

Or, again in place of the see-through church in “The Enigma of an Autumn Afternoon” (1910).

I got the chance to see this living concrete wall standing on display at BDNY 2024 just last week. This system of wall treatments is bold geometric stackable blocks made of a hollow lightweight concrete.

The blocks themselves are relatively lightweight with integrated pockets for living plants. Ferns and flora of varying degrees of verdure were on display.

Spolia itself was convalescent. Among hundreds of BDNY booths of brightly lit chandeliers, glossy surfaces, vivid textiles, and multitudes of people, this build-your-own brutalist structure, so to speak, offered a much needed moment of peace, of rest, of calm. I could breathe easier in its presence.

Spolia can be used as a free-standing wall, a screen, or as an attachment to an existing wall. Use indoors or out. Finish options include a pinky Earth, a marbled White, Light Grey, Grey, Dark Grey, and Black. Opiary Studios is located in Brooklyn.

Learn more at Opiary.