WANAFOTO: Rome

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24/09/25

Myth and Marble: Ancient Roman Sculpture from the Torlonia Collection @ Kimbell Art Museum, Fort Worth

Myth and Marble: Ancient Roman Sculpture from the Torlonia Collection

Kimbell Art Museum, Fort Worth

September 14, 2025 – January 25, 2026

Statue of Cupid and Psyche

Roman, Imperial Period (second half of 2nd century AD)

Marble

Torlonia Collection, Rome

Statue of Artemis Ephesia

Roman, Imperial Period (2nd century AD)

Marble

Torlonia Collection, Rome

The Torlonia Nile, Formerly the Barberini-Albani Nile

Roman, Imperial Period, Flavian Era (late 1st century AD)

Gray marble

Torlonia Collection, Rome

The Kimbell Art Museum presents the exhibition Myth and Marble: Ancient Roman Sculpture from the Torlonia Collection, in the Renzo Piano Pavilion. This exhibition brings to North America for the first time a selection of fifty-eight rarely seen masterpieces from the world’s most important private collection of Roman sculpture.

“The opportunity to bring large-scale works of ancient Roman sculpture to the American public is extremely rare, and we at the Kimbell are grateful to Fondazione Torlonia for creating this once-in-a-lifetime experience,” said Eric Lee, director of the Kimbell Art Museum. “This is the first exhibition of ancient Roman sculpture in the Kimbell’s fifty-three-year history and is all the more exciting because the legendary Torlonia Collection has been largely unseen for the last seventy years.”

Established during the course of the nineteenth century by the Franco-Italian banker Prince Giovanni Torlonia (1754–1829) and his son Prince Alessandro (1800–1886), the Torlonia Collection was handed down over generations, eventually growing into the largest private collection of ancient Roman sculptures. This veritable “collection of collections” was assembled through acquisitions from prominent collections of Roman patrician families and from excavations undertaken on the family’s own estates throughout Italy. By 1876, Prince Alessandro Torlonia created a museum to house and exhibit the family’s impressive holdings of ancient marbles. The Museo Torlonia was open to small groups until its closure at the onset of World War II. During this closure, Fondazione Torlonia was created at the behest of Prince Alessandro Torlonia (1925–2017) for the continued study and conservation of both the collection and the Villa Albani Torlonia, a monumental complex and one of the highest expressions of eighteenth-century taste. The sculptures remained largely unseen by the public until Fondazione Torlonia’s first exhibition, at the Musei Capitolini in Rome in 2020. Myth and Marble comes to North America after a recent exhibition of the Torlonia Collection drew unprecedented audiences at the Louvre in Paris.

The works on view at the Kimbell Art Museum were made between the late fifth century BC and the early fourth century AD, with most dating to the High Imperial period (first–second centuries AD). Visitors see examples of the most emblematic genres of ancient marble sculpture, including large-scale figures of gods, goddesses, and mythic heroes, vivid portraits of emperors and their families, and magnificent funerary monuments. Half of the sculptures have been newly cleaned, conserved, and studied specifically for this North American presentation.

Portrait of a Young Woman, known as the Maiden of Vulci

Roman, late Republican Period (mid-1st century BC)

Marble

Torlonia Collection, Rome

The exhibition is organized thematically into six sections. Upon entering the Kimbell’s special exhibition galleries, visitors first encounter three Icons of the Torlonia Collection, including the mid-first-century BC Portrait of a Young Woman, known as the Maiden of Vulci. This is among the earlier and best-known works in the Torlonia Collection, providing a singular representation of Roman female portraiture from the early Augustan era. This and other portraits on view convey the striking naturalism that is a hallmark of ancient Roman sculpture and that viewers come to appreciate throughout the exhibition.

Statue of a Goddess, known as the Hestia Giustiniani

Roman, Imperial Period, Hadrianic Era

(first half of 2nd century AD)

Marble

Torlonia Collection, Rome.

Next, Ideal Bodies and Model Behavior introduces visitors to depictions of myriad deities from the broader Roman world. This section illustrates how, as it expanded, the Roman Empire increasingly embraced aspects of Greek culture, both in its mythology and its visual language, cementing a shared Greco-Roman cultural heritage. The Statue of a Goddess, known as the Hestia Giustiniani, one of the most important works in the collection, is also one of the very few Roman versions of the classical Greek “severe” style in existence and is the largest and most intact sculpture of its type.

Statue of an Emperor on a Throne with Portrait of Augustus

Roman, Imperial Period (1st century AD)

Marble

Torlonia Collection, Rome.

Portrait of Hadrian

Roman, Imperial Period (c. 130 AD)

Marble

Torlonia Collection, Rome.

Strategies of Succession displays second-century AD emperors and their imperial families, including a remarkable selection of female portraits. These stunningly realistic portrait sculptures, the likes of which would have permeated public and private spaces in the ancient world, functioned much as mass media does today. Visitors recognize the names of rulers such as Trajan, Hadrian, Marcus Aurelius, Commodus, and Septimius Severus, whose marble busts at once convey their likenesses, deliver overt political propaganda, and communicate subtle messages of power, authority, and identity.

Statue of a Resting Goat

Roman, Imperial Period, Trajanic Era (body: late 1st century

head: attributed to Gian Lorenzo Bernini [1598–1680])

Marble

Torlonia Collection, Rome

Not a single work on view in Myth and Marble looks today as it did when it left the ancient artist’s workshop, whether through the wear and tear of time or by the hands of generations of art restorers. Restoration and Reconstruction spotlights sculptures that have been altered over the centuries—sometimes into nearly new works altogether—reflecting how collectors from the Renaissance through the nineteenth century preferred unfragmented objects to decorate their villas and estates. Intact portrait heads were regularly placed on newly carved busts in the past, and sometimes unrelated elements were assembled into wholly new works of art. The Rondanini-Type Medusa on a Trapezophoros (Table Leg) with a Griffin’s Head, for instance, was created through the assembly of two otherwise distinct, ancient sculptural fragments: a Medusa head joined to a Griffin-headed table leg. Sometimes great artists were engaged to update or perfect ancient fragments. For example, a mundane sculpture of a reclining ram was entirely transformed, made glorious with the addition of an exuberant head carved by the famed Baroque sculptor Gian Lorenzo Bernini around 1620.

Portus Relief

Roman, Imperial Period (2nd–3rd century AD)

Marble

Torlonia Collection, Rome

As one of the largest landowners in nineteenth-century Rome, Prince Alessandro Torlonia hired archaeologists to excavate some of his own estates, notably a tract along the Via Appia Antica, which was a major ancient thoroughfare near Rome, and a property at Portus, once ancient Rome’s main harbor. Torlonia Excavations displays remarkable discoveries from these excavations, including an Attic Votive Relief from the fifth century BC, which is the only Greek sculpture in the exhibition and the earliest work in the entire Torlonia Collection. The Portus Relief offers a rare representation of the place where it was found, combining elements of the architectural and commercial landscape with symbolic motifs and deities.

Sarcophagus Depicting the Labors of Hercules

and Lid with Reclining Couple

Roman, Imperial Period (second half of 2nd century AD)

Marble

Torlonia Collection, Rome.

Sarcophagus Depicting the Labors of Hercules

and Lid with Reclining Couple

Roman, Imperial Period (second half of 2nd century AD)

Marble

Torlonia Collection, Rome.

Myth and Marble closes with Death and Remembrance, reflecting a major strength of the Torlonia Collection: funerary monuments. These superb carvings underscore the longstanding Roman tradition of commemorating the dead and visually memorializing their likenesses and personal identities in marble, to be publicly displayed and visited by generations of descendants. Several extraordinary sarcophagi (stone coffins) such as the Sarcophagus Depicting the Labors of Hercules and Lid with Reclining Couple are among the largest sculpted works in marble to survive from ancient Rome.

“Each of these exceptional sculptures has lived many lives over the centuries,” said Jennifer Casler Price, senior curator of Asian, African, and ancient American art at the Kimbell Art Museum and curator of the exhibition for the Kimbell. “Reaching across space and time, connecting the past with the present, these powerful works still resonate with us today. We are thrilled to be able to share their fascinating stories with our visitors and to bring these magnificent ambassadors from Rome to Texas.”

“Fondazione Torlonia is excited to be sharing the Torlonia Collection with audiences in North America for the first time. This exceptional group of ancient sculptures is a testament to the enduring cultural legacy of ancient Rome, as well as the vision and passion of multiple generations of the Torlonia family,” said Alessandro Poma Murialdo, president of Fondazione Torlonia.

“By sharing these rare masterpieces with the public, Fondazione Torlonia aims to deepen appreciation for and foster a renewed connection with the artistic achievements of the ancient world,” said Carlotta Loverini Botta, director of Fondazione Torlonia. “The universal spirit that has always informed classical art must continue to be nurtured for generations to come. It is a universal language that thrives on the ongoing reinvention of the classics through engagement with modern culture.”

Portrait of a Man, known as the Old Man of Otricoli
Roman, late Republican Period (1st century BC)
Marble
Torlonia Collection, Rome
© Fondazione Torlonia. Photo by Lorenzo De Masi

Portrait of Faustina the Younger
Roman, Imperial Period, Antonine Era (c. 160 AD)
Marble
Torlonia Collection, Rome
© Fondazione Torlonia. Photo by Lorenzo De Masi

Myth and Marble: Ancient Roman Sculpture from the Torlonia Collection is co-organized by the Art Institute of Chicago and Fondazione Torlonia, in collaboration with the Kimbell Art Museum, the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, and the Museum Box.

The 160-page hardcover catalogue includes essays by Lisa Ayla Çakmak, the Mary and Michael Jaharis Chair and Curator, Arts of Greece, Rome, and Byzantium, The Art Institute of Chicago; Katharine A. Raff, the Elizabeth McIlvaine Curator, Arts of Greece, Rome, and Byzantium, The Art Institute of Chicago; Silvia Beltrametti, senior lecturer in the Department of Art History, Theory, and Criticism at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago; and Salvatore Settis, independent art historian.

KIMBELL ART MUSEUM

3333 Camp Bowie Boulevard, Fort Worth, Texas 76107

kimbellart.org

20/04/24

Chefs-d'oeuvre de la Galerie Borghèse @ Musée Jacquemart-André, Paris

Chefs-d'oeuvre de la Galerie Borghèse

Musée Jacquemart-André, Paris

6 septembre 2024 - 5 janvier 2025

Caravage

Garçon à la corbeille de fruits, vers 1595

Huile sur toile, 70 x 67 cm

Galleria Borghese, Rome

Titien

Vénus bandant les yeux de l’Amour, vers 1565

Huile sur toile, 116 x 184 cm

Galleria Borghese, Rome

Pierre Paul Rubens

Suzanne et les vieillards, vers 1606-1607

Huile sur toile, 94 x 67 cm

Galleria Borghese, Rome

Le Musée Jacquemart-André réouvre ses portes début septembre 2024 en présentant une exposition consacrée à une quarantaine d'oeuvres exceptionnelles de la Galerie Borghèse à Rome.

La Villa Borghese Pinciana, qui abrite aujourd’hui la Galerie Borghèse, fut construite entre 1607 et 1616 sur ordre du puissant cardinal Scipion Borghèse (1577-1633), neveu du pape Paul V (1550-1621). S’inspirant des luxueuses villas romaines, Scipion souhaitait consacrer ce palais entouré de jardins à l’exposition de ses collections d’œuvres antiques et de peintures et sculptures modernes, évoquant un nouvel âge d’or. Doté d’un goût sûr, d’une insatiable curiosité et d’une extraordinaire capacité à déceler les chefs-d’œuvre parmi les productions de son temps, Scipion Borghèse complétait sa collection par tous les moyens, légaux ou non. Il s’est ainsi imposé comme l’un des premiers et des plus importants collectionneurs et mécènes de l’histoire de l’art moderne, faisant de la Villa Borghese un véritable musée avant la lettre. Selon ses dernières volontés, l’ensemble de ses collections et de ses propriétés fut transmis génération après génération sans être dispersé pendant près de deux cents ans, et les héritiers Borghèse poursuivirent l’enrichissement du patrimoine familial. Au début du XIXe siècle, plusieurs centaines de sculptures antiques furent néanmoins cédées à Napoléon Bonaparte par son beau-frère, le prince Camille Borghèse (1775-1832) ; leur absence a été progressivement comblée par de nouvelles acquisitions. La famille Borghèse finit par vendre la villa et son musée à l’Etat italien en 1902. La Galerie Borghèse demeure aujourd’hui un symbole de la prospérité économique, culturelle et artistique de Rome à l’époque moderne, et à ce titre une destination incontournable pour les visiteurs de la Ville éternelle.

Antonello da Messina

Portrait d’homme, vers 1476

Tempera et huile sur panneau, 31 x 25,2 cm

Galleria Borghese, Rome

Bernin

Autoportrait à l’âge mûr, vers 1635-1640

Huile sur toile, 53 x 43 cm

Galleria Borghese, Rome

Grâce au partenariat entre le Musée Jacquemart-André et la Galerie Borghèse – dans le contexte d’une campagne de travaux de rénovation du musée romain à l’automne 2024 – cette exposition présentera une sélection d’oeuvres exceptionnelles issue de cet ensemble artistique unique au monde. Le public pourra notamment y (re)découvrir les productions de grands noms de l’art italien des XVIe et XVIIe siècle (Raphaël, Antonello da Messina, Parmesan, Lorenzo Lotto, Titien, Véronèse, Caravage, Bernin…) et de peintres nordiques ayant séjourné en Italie (Rubens, Gerrit von Honthorst…). L’exposition rendra aussi hommage à des peintres moins connus du grand public, tels qu’Annibal Carrache, Guido Reni, Le Cavalier d’Arpin et Jacopo Bassano. La présentation des œuvres dans l’exposition éclairera à la fois l’histoire de la collection et le sens des grandes thématiques explorées par les artistes. L’exposition sera accompagnée d’un catalogue, ouvrage de référence en langue française sur la collection de peintures modernes de la Galerie Borghèse.

COMMISSARIAT DE L'EXPOSITION

Dr. Francesca Cappelletti est Directrice de la Galerie Borghèse à Rome. Spécialiste du baroque italien, et particulièrement du mouvement caravagesque, elle a contribué à la redécouverte de L’Arrestation du Christ du Caravage (aujourd’hui à Dublin) au début des années 1990. Entre 2014 et 2018, elle a oeuvré en tant que vice-présidente du Conseil Supérieur des Biens Culturels au ministère de la Culture italien. Avant de prendre la tête de la Villa Borghese en 2020, elle a été professeur d’histoire de l’art de la Renaissance à l’Université de Ferrare. Francesca Cappelletti a été commissaire de nombreuses expositions, dont « Nature et Idéal. Le paysage à Rome, 1600-1650 » (Paris, Grand Palais et Madrid, Museo del Prado, 2011), « Les Bas-fonds du Baroque » (Rome, Villa Médicis et Paris, Petit Palais, 2014), « Caravage à Rome, amis et ennemis » (Paris, Musée Jacquemart-André, 2018) et « Georges de la Tour. L’Europe des Lumières » (Milan, Palazzo Reale, 2020).

Pierre Curie est Conservateur général du patrimoine. Spécialiste de peinture italienne et espagnole du XVIIe siècle, il a également travaillé sur celle du XIXe siècle français au Musée du Petit Palais où il a commencé sa carrière de conservateur. Par la suite chargé du domaine de la peinture à l’Inventaire général, il a corédigé et conduit le Vocabulaire typologique et technique de la peinture et du dessin (paru en 2009). Nommé responsable de la filière peinture du département restauration du Centre de recherche et de restauration des Musées de France en 2007, il a coordonné et suivi quelques grandes restaurations de tableaux des musées nationaux (Léonard de Vinci, Titien, Rembrandt, Poussin…). Pierre Curie est conservateur du musée Jacquemart-André depuis janvier 2016 et co-commissaire de toutes ses expositions.

MUSÉE JACQUEMART ANDRÉ

158 boulevard Haussmann, 75008 Paris

www.musee-jacquemart-andre.com

06/12/23

Helmut Newton. Legacy @ Museo dell'Ara Pacis, Roma - Retrospective Exhibition

Helmut Newton. Legacy

Museo dell'Ara Pacis, Rome

18 october 2023 - 10 march 2024

Helmut Newton

Self-portrait. Monte Carlo, 1993

Helmut Newton

Self-portrait at Yva's studio. Berlin, 1936

Helmut Newton

Italian Vogue. Como, 1996

On the occasion of the hundredth anniversary of the most beloved and debated photographer of all time, the Helmut Newton Legacy exhibition is on display at the Ara Pacis Museum in Rome. The exhibition, through about 250 photographs, magazines, documents, and videos, offers a glimpse into the uniqueness, style, and provocative side of the artist's work.

An elegant, provocative, and revolutionary artist. One hundred years after his birth, the Museo dell'Ara Pacis in Rome is hosting the vast retrospective HELMUT NEWTON. LEGACY, conceived to celebrate the photographer (Berlin, 1920 - Los Angeles, 2004) and postponed due to the pandemic. A journey through his adventurous life through more than 200 shots, some of which have never been seen before, magazines and documents, to take a new look at the work of a 20th century protagonist who used to describe himself as follows: "My job as a portrait photographer is to seduce, amuse and entertain".

The photographer, born Helmut Neustädter, whose surname was later anglicised into Newton, was born in Berlin in 1920 to a wealthy Jewish family and was already familiar with the camera at the age of 12, so much so that at 16 he worked as an apprentice to the famous fashion photographer Yva, experimenting with his first self-portraits, staged with great confidence. In 1938 he was forced to leave Germany due to anti-Semitic persecution and, after a passage to Trieste, he embarked for Australia where he opened a small photography studio that would mark the beginning of his career.

The exhibition traces the life, both human and professional, of a man who is remembered as the author of shots that have made the history of the photography, appearing on the most important covers of fashion magazines and enriched by a corpus of unpublished works revealing lesser-known aspects of his work. Some 80 photographs are in fact on display for the first time in this exhibition. Evidence from archive materials such as contact prints or special publications complete the exhibition.

Six chronological chapters recount Helmut Newton’s photographic experience: from his beginnings in the 1940s and 1950s in Australia to his final years of production, passing through the 1960s in France, the 1970s in the United States, the 1980s between Monte Carlo and Los Angeles and the numerous shoots around the world in the 1990s.

Helmut Newton

Nova, Paris 1971

Helmut Newton

Jerry Hall, American Vogue. Paris, 1974

The visitor has the opportunity to enter into the heart of the creative process to discover the secrets of images that have become part of our visual and collective memory, such as the Big Nudes series that was to become his most successful book.

His eye brought a revolution in fashion photography, as evidenced by his shots of the creations of fashion designer André Courrèges, taken for the British magazine Queen in 1964, and his collaborations with personalities such as Yves Saint Laurent, Karl Lagerfeld, Thierry Mugler, Chanel and many others. His name entered the photographers' elite when in 1961, at the invitation of Vogue Paris, he moved with his wife June to the French capital, where he perfected his style. A specific focus is devoted to fashion shoots considered avant-garde at the time, such as those inspired by the films of Alfred Hitchcock, Francois Truffaut and Federico Fellini - not just shots, but real stories containing intriguing details. Moving from one section to the next, it is possible to glimpse Newton's intense portrait activity, which has immortalised famous faces such as Gianni Versace, Andy Warhol, Charlotte Rampling, Romy Schneider, Catherine Deneuve, Mick Jagger, Nastassja Kinski, David Bowie, Elizabeth Taylor and Arthur Miller, to name but a few.

The exhibition dedicates considerable space to the photographer's professional experience in Italy and his fruitful relationship with the Italian publishing industry. An important cooperation that allowed him to capture the fascinating atmospheres of cities such as Montecatini, Florence, Milan, Capri, Venice and, of course, Rome. Helmut Newton was at home in Rome, as eight shots set in the capital, mostly from the series known as Paparazzi, recount. This photo sequence, together with two other fashion images, once again testifies his ability to create ephemeral and intense atmospheres by transforming a photo into a vision.

MUSEO DELL'ARA PACIS

Lungotevere in Augusta - 00186 Roma

Ingresso alla mostra da Via di Ripetta n. 180

www.arapacis.it

16/11/23

Riccardo Dalisi @ MAXXI, Rome - Retrospective exhibition "Radicalmente"

Riccardo Dalisi: Radicalmente

MAXXI, Rome

10 November 2023 – 3 March 2024

Riccardo Dalisi con un "robot-caffettiero", anni Ottanta

Foto di Ugo Magliacano

Courtesy Archivio fotografico Alessi

Riccardo Dalisi in his studio, Naples

Photo by Fulvio Cutolo

Courtesy Archivio Riccardo Dalisi

MAXXI presents a major retrospective dedicated to RICCARDO DALISI (Potenza 1931 – Naples 2022), a year after his death.

Riccardo Dalisi was one of the most multifaceted Italian designers of recent decades. He was unconventional, revolutionary, and hard to classify. Moving freely between architecture and design, art and craftsmanship, participation and social engagement, academic research, and popular traditions, he explored paths and methods that, though often misunderstood, stand out as ground-breaking today, when facing the great challenges of our times as far as design is concerned.

Riccardo Dalisi

Pavone chair designed for Zanotta in 1981

Courtesy Zanotta SpA

Riccardo Dalisi

Mariposa bench designed for Zanotta in 1984

Courtesy Zanotta SpA

The MAXXI exhibition presents Riccardo Dalisi's work for the first time in its extreme diversity and vastness. From creative workshops with children in Naples (those in Rione Traiano are depicted in a series of photographs by Mimmo Jodice) to his revolutionary work in the field of design (such as ultra-poor design, characterized by poor techniques and recycled materials, including sculptures, lamps, and tin objects created by migrant laborers and unemployed people). From built architecture (such as the Borsa Merci in Naples, created with Michele Capobianco and Massimo Pica Ciamarra in 1964, or the "creative restoration" interventions in the Irpinia villages struck by the 1980 earthquake) to imagined architecture with visionary, impossible projects, utopian plans, and ironic yet provocative drawings that, as a whole, evoke a surreal, poetic, and critical world. The exhibition also presents the artistic revival of popular culture and tradition, with paintings and sculptures, often in large format, where characters of Neapolitan and Mediterranean culture are brought to life.

Riccardo Dalisi

Tecnica povera, 1973

Sedia in cartapesta, 1973

Courtesy Archivio Riccardo Dalisi

Riccardo Dalisi

La caffettiera-vestale, Golfo di Napoli, 1985

Archivio Fotografico Alessi

Riccardo Dalisi

Pifferaio Magico / Pied Piper, Rame e verderame /

Copper and verdigris, 2015

Photo by Fulvio Cutolo, 2016

Courtesy Archivio Riccardo Dalisi

Also exhibited for the first time is the Sedia del cece (Chickpea Chair), a series of drawings that Dalisi asked from Andy Warhol, Joseph Beuys, Ettore Sottsass, Enzo Mari, Bruno Munari, Paolo Portoghesi, Superstudio, Archizoom, Zziggurat, 9999, Aldo Rossi, Franco Purini, Franco Raggi, Ugo La Pietra, Gae Aulenti, Hans Hollein, and many others. It is inspired by a small chair made by a Neapolitan girl using scrap wood and a clothespin, with a chickpea laid on it.

Among his most famous works is the reinterpretation of the Neapolitan coffee maker, the result of research carried out between 1979 and 1987 for the Alessi company, awarded the Compasso d'Oro (“Golden Compass”). It was conducted with the craftsmen of Rua Catalana in Naples and Alessi technicians in Piedmont, generated, in addition to a model that went into production, hundreds of objects halfway between a coffee maker and a puppet, in which functional research, anonymous design, and the ritual dimension of coffee merge into the forms of "Totocchi" (Totò + Pinocchio), warriors, knights, robots, Pulcinella, and other fairy-tale and mythological characters.

Riccardo Dalisi

Sketch realised for publication

“Riccardo Dalisi Decrescita. Architettura della nuova innocenza”

Corraini editore, 2006

Courtesy Archivio Riccardo Dalisi

Through drawings, sketches, furnishings, embroidery, objects, books, sculptures, paintings, photographs, archive documents, films, and other materials, the radical and revolutionary nature of the "Dalisi method" is revealed. Curator Gabriele Neri writes, "By exalting interdisciplinary trespassing, the overturning of the concept of the author, the 'creative disorder,' irony, and play, the potential of residue and dross, Dalisi fought to reaffirm the 'tolerant strength of the community sense, for which everyone, even the least efficient and the outcast, is useful, necessary.' His work hovers between utopia and reality and transforms what we thought were marginal themes and territories into pivotal points of discussion and engagement, especially in times of crisis that force us to rethink our relationship with the project and the world."

Riccardo Dalisi

Non solo pensiero, 1997

Courtesy Archivio Riccardo Dalisi

Riccardo Dalisi

Ultrapoverissimo, latta cucita e fil di ferro /

sewn tin and wire, Naples, 2003

Foto di Fulvio Cutolo, 2005

The exhibition also highlights the fruitful interactions between Riccardo Dalisi and artists, designers, architects, and critics, including Mimmo Jodice (to whom MAXXI pays tribute with the exhibition of a core of images from the Mediterraneo series at the Archive Center), Alessandro Mendini, Giancarlo De Carlo, Massimo Pica Ciamarra, Mimmo Paladino, Ettore Sottsass, and many others.

His work blossomed in the cultural and artistic climate of Naples in the sixties and seventies. It is the expression of a "Mediterranean" nature resistant to a homogenizing, disastrous modernity. However, it has always drawn from much broader influences, both geographically and disciplinarily—pedagogy, semiotics, linguistics, sociology, theatre, etc.—which the exhibition aims to highlight.

The setting-up by Novembre Studio evokes the image of an upside-down, alternative world, much like Dalisi's perspective on reality. The dreamlike figures that the master drew and sculpted over the years guide the visitor through an out-of-scale landscape, telling the story of his poetics in a thorough, radical way.

The exhibition also includes the outcomes of research conducted, starting from the traces of the Neapolitan architect, by the artist-photographer Vincenzo Castella, in collaboration with NABA - Nuova Accademia di Belle Arti (“New Academy of Fine Arts”), involving a group of young visual artists from the Academy. Through the displayed photographs, the plunges into the workshops of the tinsmiths of Rua Catalana, the streets of the Spanish Quarters, among the "garitte" ("watchtowers") built at Palazzo Reale, and in the buildings constructed in Ponticelli and Rione Traiano, which in the seventies were the stage for pioneering workshops conducted with children.

A book, curated by Gabriele Neri, has been published for the exhibition. It is dedicated to the "Sedia del cece" series, edited by Corraini, featuring drawings by Riccardo Dalisi, Andy Warhol, Joseph Beuys, Ettore Sottsass, Enzo Mari, Bruno Munari, Paolo Portoghesi, Superstudio, Archizoom, Zziggurat, 9999, Aldo Rossi, Franco Purini, Franco Raggi, Gae Aulenti, Hans Hollein, Ugo La Pietra, etc. The volume includes accounts by scholars and designers and an essay by the curator. Texts by Lorenza Baroncelli, Stefano Boeri, Sara Catenacci, Domitilla Dardi, Paolo Deganello, Piero Frassinelli, Claudio Gambardella, Fulvio Irace, Ugo La Pietra, Anna Maria Laville, Iolanda Lima, Gabriele Neri, Gianni Pettena, Franco Purini, Franco Raggi, Lia Rumma, Angela Tecce.

Fondazione MAXXI | Museo nazionale delle arti del XXI secolo

Via Guido Reni, 4A - 00196 Roma

www.maxxi.art

15/11/23

Mimmo Jodice @ MAXXI, Rome - Exhibition "Mediterraneo" - Curated by Simona Antonacci - In collaboration with Studio Mimmo Jodice

Mimmo Jodice: Mediterraneo

MAXXI, Rome

Curated by Simona Antonacci

In collaboration with Studio Mimmo Jodice

November 10, 2023 - April 14, 2024

Mimmo Jodice

Capri, 1984

Mimmo Jodice

Atleta della Villa dei Papiri, 1986

Mediterraneo is one of the most renowned projects by Mimmo Jodice (Naples, 1934), a Neapolitan artist among the major interpreters of contemporary photography. The Archives Center of MAXXI Architecture showcases a collection of vintage photographs from this series, part of the MAXXI Architecture Photography Collection.

Archival documents, contact sheets, interviews, study materials, and bibliographical resources are also displayed to delve into the genesis of the project. Mimmo Jodice developed the project during the '80s and '90s after the experiments of the '60s and '70s, nurturing a growing interest in ancient themes, memory, origins, while refining his poetics centred around the concept of "losing oneself while looking," that is, pursuing visions that exist beyond reality.

This translates into various projects dedicated to Mediterranean culture and archaeology, starting with an initial exploration of areas closest to him (Paestum, Neapolis, Pompeii, Cuma, Baia) and then expanding to the Mare Nostrum—from Greece to Tunisia, from Jordan to Libya—reaching museums worldwide. The "encounter" with the Athletes in the Villa of the Papyri at the Archaeological Museum of Naples around 1985, testified in the exhibition by a video of that time, represents a turning point in this research. The systematic pursuit continued in the 1990s and found international recognition with a major exhibition at the Philadelphia Museum of Art in 1995.

Mimmo Jodice

Peristilio romano, Bulla Regia, Tunisia, 1993-94

Mimmo Jodice

Roman Boy, Boston, 2000

In Mediterraneo, the faces and bodies of the statues, as well as the architectures, landscapes, ancient ruins, and myths, are transfigured through deep shadows, moving surfaces, sudden glares, thinning, and dilating contours achieved through skilful darkroom techniques, reflecting Mimmo Jodice's expressive language. The difference between the contact sheets presented in display cases and the final work highlights the uniqueness of each print and the complexity of this process, narrated by the author himself in an exclusive video produced by the Museo di Capodimonte in Naples.

Mimmo Jodice's journey revolves around the language of photography as an expression of his own visions and, at the same time, a path through a symbolic imaginary: a journey in search of the roots of his culture guided by the idea of an extended city that starts from the Gulf of Naples to embrace the Mediterranean basin and beyond.

Fondazione MAXXI | Museo nazionale delle arti del XXI secolo

Via Guido Reni, 4A - 00196 Roma

www.maxxi.art

16/12/22

Bob Dylan @ MAXXI, Rome - "Retrospectrum" Exhibition

Bob Dylan: Retrospectrum

MAXXI, Rome

16 December 2022 – 30 April 2023

Bob Dylan: Retrospectrum, a comprehensive collection of visual works by one of the world’s most important cultural figures, opens at Rome’s National Museum of 21st Century Art—MAXXI.

Curated by Shai Baitel, the Rome exhibition follows globally-renowned showings at MAM Shanghai, China and the Patricia & Phillip Frost Art Museum in Miami, Florida in the United States. Notably, Rome is the very first European city to host this exhibition, which is being completely reimagined to interact with Zaha Hadid’s dynamic and futuristic spaces at MAXXI.

More than 100 works are on display in the exhibition, including paintings, watercolors, ink and graphite drawings, metal sculptures, video material, and archival documents that trace and explore more than 60 years of Bob Dylan’s artistic output.

Bob Dylan says: “It’s gratifying to learn that my visual works are going to be exhibited at MAXXI in Rome, a truly great museum in one of the world’s most beautiful and inspirational cities. This exhibition is meant to provide perspectives that examine the human condition and explore the mysteries of life that continue to leave us perplexed. It’s very different from my music, of course, but every bit as purposeful in its intent”.

Comments Giovanna Melandri, President of Fondazione MAXXI: "Bob Dylan is an absolute legend and one of the most important and influential cultural icons of the 20th and 21st centuries. He is a musician, a composer, a poet, a Nobel laureate in literature. With this exhibition, we will have the privilege of discovering a previously unseen aspect of his inexhaustible talent: his paintings, which, like his songs, are powerful, sincere and immediate, elicit a flavor of on-the-road travels and charm. Dylan is a piece of our history and a part of us. That is why I am particularly pleased with this exhibition at MAXXI, which tells his whole story and ours".

“This career-spanning exhibition showcases Bob Dylan’s unique approach to visual art and command of painting, drawing, and sculpting. It provides a special opportunity to view Dylan’s creative journey across time and locations, including the steps at Rome’s Piazza di Spagna as captured in the featured work “When I paint my Masterpiece”, adds the curator Shai Baitel.

Fondazione MAXXI | Museo nazionale delle arti del XXI secolo

National Museum of 21st Century Art, Rome

Via Guido Reni, 4A - 00196 Roma

www.maxxi.art

31/01/12

Damien Hirst: Spot Paintings, Gagosian Gallery exhibition in New York, London, Paris, Los Angeles, Rome, Athens, Geneva, and Hong Kong

Damien Hirst: The Complete Spot Paintings 1986-2011 Gagosian Gallery's eleven locations

Beverly Hills, Los Angeles, through February 10, 2012 New York, London, Paris, Hong Kong, through February 18 Rome, Athens, through March 10 Geneva, through March 17, 2012

I was always a colorist, I’ve always had a phenomenal love of color… I mean, I just move color around on its own. So that’s where the spot paintings came from—to create that structure to do those colors, and do nothing. I suddenly got what I wanted. It was just a way of pinning down the joy of color.

—Damien Hirst

Damien Hirst at Gagosian Gallery

Photography Prudence Cuming Associates

Damien Hirst: The Complete Spot Paintings 1986-2011, take place at once across all of Gagosian Gallery’s eleven locations. Most of the paintings are being lent by private individuals and public institutions, more than 150 different lenders from twenty countries. Conceived as a single exhibition in multiple locations, The Complete Spot Paintings 1986–2011 makes use of this demographic fact to determine the content of each exhibition according to locality.

Included in the exhibition are more than 300 paintings, from the first spot on board that Damien Hirst created in 1986; to the smallest spot painting comprising half a spot and measuring 1 x 1/2 inch (1996); to a monumental work comprising only four spots, each 60 inches in diameter; and up to the most recent spot painting completed in 2011 containing 25,781 spots that are each 1 millimeter in diameter, with no single color ever repeated.

PUBLICATION

The exhibition is accompagnied by the publication of The Complete Spot Paintings 1986–2011, a fully illustrated, comprehensive and definitive catalogue of all spot paintings made by Damien Hirst from 1986 to the present. Published by Gagosian Gallery and Other Criteria, The Complete Spot Paintings 1986–2011 includes essays by Museum of Modern Art curator Ann Temkin, cultural critic Michael Bracewell, and art historian Robert Pincus-Witten as well as a conversation between Damien Hirst, Ed Ruscha and John Baldessari.

The third issue of the Gagosian App for iPad providing an interactive, in-depth look at the series that features more than ninety spot paintings.

Damien Hirst: The Complete Spot Paintings 1986-2011 precedes the first major museum retrospective of Hirst’s work opening at Tate Modern in London in April, 2012.

DAMIEN HIRST was born in 1965 in Bristol, England. Solo exhibitions include "The Agony and the Ecstasy," Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Napoli, Naples (2004); "A Selection of Works by Damien Hirst from Various Collections," Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (2005); Astrup Fearnley Museet for Moderne Kunst, Oslo (2005); "For the Love of God," Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam (2008); "No Love Lost," The Wallace Collection, London (2009); "Requiem," Pinchuk Art Center, Kiev (2009); and “Cornucopia,” the Oceanographic Museum of Monaco (2010). He received the Turner Prize in 1995. His work is included in many important public and private collections throughout the world. Damien Hirst lives and works in London and Devon, United Kingdom.

GAGOSIAN GALLERY

www.gagosiangallery.com

New York, NY, USA: 980 Madison Avenue & 555 West 24th Street & 522 West 21st Street - Beverly Hills, LA, USA: 456 North Camden Drive - London, UK: 6-24 Britannia Street & 17-19 Davies Street - Paris, France: 4 Rue de Ponthieu - Rome, Italy: Via Francesco Crispi 16 - Geneva, Switzerland: 19 Place de Longemalle - Athens, Greece: 3 Merlin Street - Hong Kong, China: 7/F, 12 Pedder Street

05/01/05

Anselm Kiefer, Frauen, Villa Medicis, Rome

ANSELM KIEFER

DIE FRAUEN

VILLA MEDICIS, ROME
27 janvier - 8 mars 2005

L’Académie de France à Rome organise une grande exposition consacrée à Anselm Kiefer et son oeuvre. L’exposition présente une vision de l’oeuvre de cet artiste, notamment autour d’une thématique spécifique: les figures féminines les plus représentatives de l’histoire et de la mythologie classique et germanique.

L’exposition se déroulera le long d’un parcours qui, des Grandes Galeries jusqu’à l’Atelier Balthus, situé dans les jardins de la Villa Médicis, dessinera les contours de ce voyage parmi les grandes icônes féminines du passé, des Reines de France aux poétesses grecques, jusqu’aux vestales, aux divinités et aux figures mythologiques, de Madame de Staël à Bérénice, de Sapho à Daphné.

Une vaste gamme d’oeuvres, pour la plupart inédites, la majorité desquelles réalisées sur place et exclusivement pour l’exposition à l’Académie de France, entre dessins, peintures, livres, sculptures et installations, qui raconteront l’Histoire à travers des voix de femmes.

BIOGRAPHIE

ANSELM KIEFER est né le 8 mars 1945, à Donaueschingen, dans le Baden-Wüttemberg. En 1965, après son diplôme, il entreprend des études de droit à la Albert Ludwig Universität de Fribourg, qu’il interrompt en 1966 pour ne se consacrer qu’à la peinture.

Il fréquente la Staatliche Hochschule der Bildenden Künste et est l’élève de Peter Dreher. En 1969, il est à la Kunstakademie de Karlsruhe, auprès de Horst Antes, et inaugure sa première exposition individuelle à la Galerie am Kaiserplatz de Karlsruhe.

Entre 1970 et 1972, il est l’élève de Joseph Beuys à la Düsseldorf Kunstakademie. A partir de ce moment, sa biographie est confiée presque exclusivement à une lapidaire « Autobiographie », présentée dans le catalogue de l’exposition individuelle de 1977 au Bonner Kunstverein, et à une longue liste de présences aux expositions, individuelles ainsi que collectives, dans différents musées et centres d’exposition parmi les plus importants du monde.

Il participe en effet à la Documenta à Kassel en 1977 et 1982. En 1980, le cycle Verbrennen, verholzen, versenken, versanden, exposé à la Biennale de Venise, suscite de remarquables controverses.

En 1984, l’exposition personnelle à la Staatliche Kunsthalle de Düsseldorf a un énorme succès et est ensuite « exportée », d’abord au Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, ensuite à l’Israël Museum de Jérusalem.

L’exposition itinérante aux Etats Unis, entre 1984 et 1987, le consacrera définitivement artiste de niveau international.

Depuis 1993, il réside à Barjac, en France, et a transformé son studio de 35 hectares en une oeuvre d’art globale.

En 2003 et 2004, il a participé à d’importantes expositions collectives et individuelles et notamment en Italie : au Museo Archeologico Nazionale de Naples, commissaires Mario Codognato et Edoardo Cicelyn, et à l’Hangar la Bicocca de la Fondation Pirelli à Milan « Sieben Himmelspaläste » commissaire Lia Rumma. Il a par ailleurs réalisé les costumes et les décors pour l’« Oedipus auf Kolonos » avec la mise en scène de Klaus Michael Gruber au Burgtheater de Vienne et l’ « Elektra » au Théâtre San Carlo de Naples.

L’exposition sera accompagnée d’un livre d’art publié par la maison d’édition Edizioni dell’Elefante en collaboration avec l’Académie de France à Rome. Ce livre comprend l’introduction du Directeur de l’Académie de France à Rome Richard Peduzzi, les textes de Henri Loyrette, Pierre Morel, Giacomo Marramao, une digression historique de Philippe Dagen et sera illustré avec les photographies de Claudio Abate. Ce livre d’art a comme but de constituer un document tangible du passage de l’artiste à Rome et en particulier au sein de l’Académie de France.

Accademia di Francia a Roma - Villa Medici
Académie de France à Rome - Villa Médicis
Viale Trinità dei Monti, 1 - 00187 Roma

Horaires: 11h00 – 19h00 sans interruption
Jour de fermeture: mardi
Entrée: 8 Euro (plein tarif) 4.50 Euro (tarif réduit).

Cette exposition est réalisée grâce au soutien du Ministère français de la Culture et de la Communication – Délégation aux Arts Plastiques, en collaboration avec les Incontri Internazionali d’Arte et avec la participation d'Air France, de Hydrowatt, de Reggiani S.p.a. Illuminazione, de Assicurazioni Generali et de Castello del Terriccio.