14/06/2026
“One thing we cannot do without is belief. How do you believe? In what do you believe?”
For Michelangelo Pistoletto, art has never been separate from life. Across a career spanning more than seven decades, he has used art as a way of understanding how the world works and how it might be changed.
Known for his iconic Mirror Paintings, which place the viewer inside the artwork itself, Pistoletto has long challenged the idea that art is something to be observed from a distance. Instead, he sees it as a space where people, ideas and realities meet. A place where new possibilities can emerge.
This thinking led him to develop what he calls the Formula of Creation: 1 + 1 = 3. The equation suggests that when two people, ideas or forces come together, they create a third element that did not exist before. For Pistoletto, this principle extends far beyond art. It offers a way of understanding relationships, communities, politics, science and even our place within the wider universe.
In this reading from The Formula of Creation, Pistoletto reflects on belief as a creative act. Not blind faith, but the human capacity to imagine, build and transform. His question is both simple and profound. How do you believe, and in what do you believe?
The answer, he suggests, shapes the world we create together.