Contemporary artist Alex Da Corte has created a stunning homage to Claes Oldenburg's iconic Mouse Museum at Milan's prestigious Fondazione Prada. Opening on September 18, 2025, the exhibition features Da Corte's installation "Mouse Museum (Van Gogh Ear)" (2022) displayed alongside Oldenburg's original Mouse Museum (1965-1977) on the eighth floor of the Torre building. This marks the first time visitors can experience both installations simultaneously in the same space, creating a unique dialogue between two generations of pop culture-inspired art.
The exhibition is part of Atlas, Fondazione Prada's ambitious project that presents solo and comparative works by various artists across all eight floors of the Torre building. The two mini museums are positioned next to each other, allowing visitors to directly compare the artistic approaches and collections of both artists. When viewed from above, Oldenburg's structure resembles a cartoon mouse head and an early movie camera, inspired by his drawing "Geometric House." Da Corte's installation takes on a more macabre twist, shaped like a severed left ear of the mouse - a deliberate reference to the famous episode in Vincent van Gogh's life.
Both installations house extensive collections of objects that reflect on mass production, consumer culture, and the ever-changing landscape of popular culture. In an interview with designboom during the preview, Da Corte explained his curatorial approach: "I arranged the collection as a sort of self-portrait. I'm not interested in revealing a specific event or part of myself. I think viewers see what they see and find their own lives in the objects, whether or not they know the work's source. We project meaning onto objects because they ground us and make a safe space."
The visual presentation of both museums reveals fascinating contrasts in color and tone. While Oldenburg's collection appears more muted with earthy, wooden, and domestic objects that may have aged over time, Da Corte's selection bursts with vibrant colors and features more recent, familiar items arranged with a distinctly comic sensibility. "Color for me is essential," Da Corte told designboom. "Color relates to a psychological state. Colors chosen for products are meant to attract or repel. Depending on taste, you might dislike something just because of its color. When arranging things here, it's often about color; painting in space with objects. Claes also had a perfect sense for color. His objects are rich, maybe a different tonality, but similarly colorful."
Despite their different aesthetic approaches, both artists employ similar curatorial techniques in presenting their collections. Neither museum organizes items alphabetically, by material, or by production year. Instead, both rely on loosely associative sequences that depend primarily on visual similarities and suggestive connections between objects. This approach creates an intuitive, almost dreamlike journey through each collection that encourages viewers to make their own interpretations and connections.
Da Corte's Mouse Museum (Van Gogh Ear) features an eclectic array of playful personal objects that span contemporary pop culture and everyday life. Among the notable items are a Harry Potter magic wand, a Bart Simpson thermos, various kitchen utensils, a plastic beer pong cup, and a foam cast of Marcel Duchamp's face. The collection also includes a ceramic-glazed Garfield statue, a yellow rooster with a tail made of quill feathers, wearable feet gloves that resemble real skin, beer bottles, brooms, a miniature disco ball, a blasted pumpkin, and what might be considered the showstopper - a zombie-looking head mounted on a lamp base.
These contemporary objects mirror the spirit of items found in Oldenburg's original Mouse Museum, which features equally intriguing pieces such as a rotting slice of pie, a balloon shaped like a human leg, an enlarged cluster of bananas, a giant ceramic ear, and a miniaturized ladder. "Looking at Claes's works today, I don't know the objects, but I'm amused or reminded of something," Da Corte shared. "I imagine where they came from and their function. My interest comes from thrift stores, where you find a fragment of an object and wonder about its function. Without its original purpose, it can have a new life. Seeing a second or third life for objects is exciting."
For Da Corte, seeing Oldenburg's actual Mouse Museum collection represents the fulfillment of a 25-year fascination. He first encountered Oldenberg's work as an undergraduate student about 25 years ago in his university library. "I stumbled upon the book he made with his partner to mark the presentation of the Mouse Museum," he recalled. "I knew Claes's work and his relationships to soft things, sculpture, and performance, but I didn't know much about contemporary art. When I saw the Mouse Museum, I was taken by all it afforded an audience and how generous it was. Only today am I seeing the real one. For 25 years, I've been wondering about this work."
Da Corte originally created his Mouse Museum (Van Gogh Ear) in 2022 for his survey exhibition "Mr. Remember," which was displayed at the Louisiana Museum in Humlebæk, Denmark. The piece emerged from his contemplation of what a retrospective of his own work would look like and what it means to remember himself and the objects he had gathered throughout his life. "The person who did that so correctly was Claes," he explained. "I thought, I can't remake the whole museum; it's too sacred. So I thought, I'll cut off an ear: a little piece of me, a little piece of him."
The exhibition at Fondazione Prada offers visitors a rare opportunity to witness this artistic dialogue between two masters of pop culture art. Located on the eighth floor of the Torre building within Fondazione Prada's complex, the display will be accessible to the public starting September 18, 2025. Visitors can also explore "Sueño Perro: Instalación Celuloide" by Alejandro G. Iñárritu, a cinematic and photographic exhibition that unveils previously hidden film materials and imagery by the acclaimed Mexican filmmaker, preserved for 25 years in the film archives of the National Autonomous University of Mexico.
