Dubai (AFP)
Officials from the Italian pavilion at the Dubai World's Fair assured Thursday that a replica of Michelangelo's sculpture of David had not been censored by the United Arab Emirates, despite a scenography hiding the lower body naked in the majority of visitors.
Italian media had criticized the way in which the 5.20-meter-high sculpture, a replica of a Renaissance masterpiece, is displayed on two levels in the Italy pavilion, pointing to the Emirati organizers, accused of a form of censorship.
The public only has access to the first floor, from where only the head and torso are visible, while the ground floor, showing the lower part of the body, is reserved for VIPs and other institutional visitors.
This provision "allows visitors to look (...) David eye to eye," said the organizers of the pavilion in a statement.
And according to them, the presence of Emirati officials at the inauguration of the statue in April is "proof that no form of censorship has been imposed".
For the artistic director of the Davide Rampello pavilion, it is about discovering the statue from a "more introspective perspective" than the original which is in the Galleria dell'Accademia in Florence, Italy.
The organizers also reported daily meetings on the ground floor in which high-level personalities participate who can "observe the lower part of the statue fully exposed" to the gaze.
Postponed by a year, the Dubai World Expo 2020, the first in history to be organized in the Middle East, opened its doors last week, after a grand opening ceremony.
This replica of David is made of acrylic resin and weighs 550 kilos, ten times less than the original, in marble, sculpted between 1501 and 1504.
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