Anarchy and ecstasy

EVER since she was a girl growing up on a farm in the north of England, Cornelia Parker has enjoyed getting her hands dirty. In her latest work, “The Sub-conscious of a Monument”, she uses dirt excavated from underneath the leaning tower of Pisa to make an earth installation in Turin's Galleria d'Arte Moderna (GAM). “When I learned they were restoring the monument by removing the earth from one side of the tower, I negotiated with the authorities to take some of it because I was fascinated by the idea of taking the sub-soil of such a monument, which hasn't seen the light of day for over 800 years.”