From June 1st to November 24th 2013
Palazzo Fortuny, Venice

Antoni Tàpies’ ‘eye’, his way of perceiving things, of looking around himself without limits of time and space, in a striving for answers about the Universe, human nature, art, the mystery of life. A year after the death oft he brilliant Catalan artist (Barcelona, 1923-2012), a key exponent of international informal art, the Fondazione Musei Civici di Venezia and the Axel and May Vervoordt Foundation pay tribute to him in Venice with a fascinating exhibition aiming to reveal the essence of the art produced by this major figure in 20th-century art.

Tàpies, who in his long life gained the highest recognition, including a gold medal for the Fine Arts from King Juan Carlos, an honorary degree from the Royal College of Art in London (1981), and the painting prize at the Venice Biennale in 1993, constantly sought answers to the mysteries of existence and the common features of humanity, leaving aside genres, time and place; an intrinsic sense, a “universal power” in things from which to draw stimuli and possible lines of development. He explored ancient, modern or contemporary art of various genres and provenance, from Marcel Duchamp to Paul Klee and Lucio Fontana, Wassily Kandinsky to Miró, Picasso and Goya, products of distant cultures such as Asian and African art, plus music, poetry, philosophy and science to “fertilise” contemporary art.

Realised in close collaboration with the Tàpies family, and laid out in the intimate and extremely appropriate setting of the home of Mariano Fortuny – himself a Spaniard and eclectic collector – the exhibition will present a selection of the artist’s key works, reinterpreted within the context of his private collection with the aim of gaining a sense of how Tàpies looked at the world as artist and collector. Alongside paintings by the Catalan artist, there will be a number of works by other artists of the 20th-century, such as Joan Miró, Pablo Picasso, Kazuo Shiraga, Franz Kline,Jackson Pollock and Jannis Kounellis and a number of antique Oriental andtribal sculptures. All of them works from the private home of Tàpies and in many cases displayed to the public here for the first time.There will be some important artists’ books, with powerful lithographs produced by Tàpies in collaboration with writers and poets, and it will be possible to listen to the music of the 20th-century composers who most fascinated him: Schönberg, Alban Berg, Shelsi, JohnCage and Anton Webern.Finally. A tribute to the art and eclectic personality of Antoni Tàpies will be paid by some of the greatest artists alive today who are close to him: Perejaume Borrell, Anthony Caro, Lawrence Carroll,Sadaharu Horio, Tsuyoshi Maekawa, Kichizaemon XV Raku, ShiroTsujimura and Gunther Uecker.

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Co-produced with Vervoordt Foundation
Scientific coordination Gabriella Belli
Curated by Daniela Ferretti, Natasha Hébert, Toni Tàpies, Axel Vervoordt

Dall’1 giugno al 24 Novembre 2013
Palazzo Fortuny, Venezia

Lo “sguardo” di Antoni Tàpies: ovvero il suo sentire le cose, il suo guardare attorno a sé senza limiti di tempo e di spazio alla ricerca di risposte sull’universo, la natura umana, l’arte, il mistero della vita.

A un anno dalla scomparsa del geniale artista catalano (Barcellona 1923-2012), figura chiave dell’informale internazionale, la Fondazione Musei Civici di Venezia e la Vervoordt Foundation gli rendono omaggio con un’affascinante mostra, che mira a svelare l’essenza dell’arte di questo indiscusso protagonista del Novecento, attraverso il “suo sguardo” e dunque quei riferimenti culturali, artistici, emozionali che egli scorgeva in una pluralità di espressioni o oggetti d’arte – tra i più vari – raccolti nella sua collezione privata. Uno sguardo al tempo stesso esteriore e interiore.

Tàpies, che nella sua lunga vita ha ottenuto i massimi riconoscimenti, tra cui la medaglia d’oro per le Belle Arti dal Re Juan Carlos, la Laurea honoris causa dal Royal College of Art di Londra (1981) e il premio per la pittura alla Biennale di Venezia del ’93, si è interrogato costantemente sui misteri dell’esistenza, cercando il tratto comune dell’umanità al di là dei generi, del tempo e del luogo; un senso intrinseco, un “potere universale” nelle cose da cui trarre stimoli e possibili strade. Arte antica, moderna o contemporanea di diversi generi e provenienze da Marcel Duchamp e Paul Klee a Lucio Fontana, da Wassily Kandinsky a Miró, Picasso, Goya, prodotti di culture lontane come l’arte asiatica e africana e ancora musica, poesia, filosofia e scienza per “fecondare” la contemporaneità.

Realizzata in stretta collaborazione con la famiglia Tàpies e allestita nell’ambientazione intima e quanto mai appropriata della casa di Mariano Fortuny – anche lui spagnolo e collezionista eclettico – la mostra resenterà una scelta di opere chiave dell’artista rilette nel contesto della sua raccolta privata, proprio con l’intento di cogliere lo sguardo di Tàpies artista e collezionista.

Accanto ai dipinti del pittore catalano, ci saranno opere di artisti del XX secolo come Joan Miró, Pablo Picasso, Kazuo Shiraga, FranzKline, Jackson Pollock e Jannis Kounellis e antiche sculture orientali o tribali: tutti lavori provenienti dall’abitazione privata di Tàpies ed esposti al pubblico, in molti casi, per la prima volta.Ci saranno importanti libri d’arte con litografie realizzati da Tàpies in collaborazione con scrittori e poeti, e si potranno ascoltare le musiche dei compositori del Novecento che più affascinavano il Maestro: da Schöenberg ad Alban Berg, da Shelsi a JohnCage e Anton Webern. Infine, un tributo all’arte e alla personalità eclettica di Antoni Tàpies sarà reso da alcuni dei maggiori artisti viventi a lui vicini o anch’essi alla ricerca di risposte sul mistero e l’inesplicabile: Perejaume Borrell, Anthony Caro, Lawrence Carroll, Sadaharu Horio, Tsuyoshi Maekawa, Kichizaemon XVRaku, Shiro Tsujimura, Gunther Uecker.

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Co-prodotta con Vervoordt Foundation
Direzione scientifica Gabriella Belli
A cura di Daniela Ferretti, Natasha Hébert, Toni Tàpies, Axel Vervoordt

From 9^th February to 8^th April 2013
Palazzo Fortuny, Venice

The “Fortuny and Wagner” exhibition at Palazzo Fortuny examines the influence of Wagner’s music and art on the visual arts in Italy. Mariano Fortuny in primis was an exponent of “wagnerism“, but the exhibition also boats the contribution of an Italian contemporary artist, Mirco Marchelli. He presents in this occasion a musical installation and a series of paintings and sculptures entitled “Silent scene for low clouds“.

The exhibition is held principally on the third floor of Palazzo Fortuny, in what is generally known as the Palazzo’s “attic”. This is the part of a “home” in which the memories of past lives traditionally collect, and the same holds true for the home and studio of Mariano Fortuny, where it constitutes a store-room of various materials, selected by Marchelli to compose his works: torn sheets of paper with faded writing, dusty fabrics, boxes and photographs shaped and recomposed with an order of musical balance into new forms.

In this atmospheric, light-filled space, the artist offers a new musical installation in tribute to “Wagner and Fortuny” entitled “Low clouds“. A large cylinder with black sides becomes a “sound box” for 12 trombones and 12 flutes that create a dialogue in counterpoint, while large polychrome paintings and benches in a “silent” conversation with books, boxes and canvases immersed in wax and shaped as new packages, as waxed outlines of forms, relive and transform the past, offering an unusual side to the exhibition.

Following the exhibition as it unfolds, one comes to the top floor, and alongside Mariano’s works and the velvet works and boxes of the Wagnerian cycle, a number of small wax and canvas items “timidly” make their appearance. They are joined by stools with mysterious packages tied in string, slender ceramics with luminous transparencies that go to create the link rounding off the exhibition’s inquiry into the influence of Wagnerism, in which all artistic forms, music above all, strive towards the same goal: the “total work of art”.

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Curated by Paolo Bolpagni e Elena Povellato
In collaboration with Galleria Traghetto (Venice), Marco Rossi Artecontemporanea (Milan) and Cardelli&Fontana Artecontemporanea (Sarzana)
Catalogue, curated by Paolo Bolpagni and Elena Povellato, with pictures by Mario Vidor; edited by Punto Marte Editore

Dal 9 febbraio all’8 aprile 2013
Palazzo Fortuny, Venezia

A Palazzo Fortuny, la mostra Fortuny e Wagner. Il wagnerismo nelle arti visive in Italia, con cui la Fondazione Musei Civici di Venezia ha inteso rendere omaggio al grande compositore tedesco nell’anno del bicentenario della nascita, si arricchisce del contributo dell’artista italiano contemporaneo Mirco Marchelli, che, per l’occasione, presenta un’installazione musicale e una serie di dipinti e sculture dal titolo Scena muta per nuvole basse.

La mostra si sviluppa principalmente al terzo piano, in quella che generalmente è conosciuta come la “soffitta”del Palazzo, il luogo che tradizionalmente raccoglie la memoria di chi vi ha vissuto. Così è anche per la casa-atelier di Mariano Fortuny, un deposito di materiali diversi, che Mirco Marchelli sceglie per comporre le sue opere: fogli strappati con scritture sbiadite, stoffe polverose, cartoni e fotografie, rimodellati e ricomposti con un ordine di musicale equilibrio in nuove forme. In questo spazio suggestivo e luminoso l’artista propone un’installazione musicale inedita in omaggio a Wagner e Fortuny intitolata Nuvole basse. Un ampio cilindro dalle pareti nere diventa “cassa di risonanza” per dodici tromboni e dodici flauti che dialogano contrapponendosi, mentre grandi dipinti policromi e panchetti in “muto” colloquio con libri, cartoni e tele immerse nella cera e rimodellate come inediti fagotti, sagome incerate di forme che, rivivendo il passato, lo trasformano, vanno a completare l’esposizione.

Lungo il percorso della mostra “Wagner e Fortuny”, invece, accanto alle opere di Mariano, “timidamente” si affacciano piccoli manufatti in tela e cera, sgabelli con misteriosi pacchi legati con lo spago, sottili ceramiche dalle luminose trasparenze che vanno a creare quel trait d’union a completamento dell’indagine della mostra sulle influenze del wagnerismo, in cui tutte le forme artistiche, musica in primis, concorrono allo stesso obiettivo: “l’opera d’arte totale”.

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A cura di Paolo Bolpagni e Elena Povellato
In collaborazione con Galleria Traghetto (Venezia), Marco Rossi Artecontemporanea (Milano) e Cardelli&Fontana Artecontemporanea (Sarzana)
Catalogo, a cura di Paolo Bolpagni e Elena Povellato con foto di Mario Vidor è edito da Punto Marte editore

Franco Vimercati.
Tutte le cose emergono dal nulla

The exhibition documents the œuvre of Franco Vimercati (Milan, 1940-2001) through the presence of over 100 of his works. An artist of great significance for the direction he took in the field of contemporary experimentation, Vimercati is still little-known to the general public today. Over the years, Vimercati concentrated in particular on photographic surveys of everyday objects from his life, giving them an unusual soul and magic: 36 bottles of water, strips of parquet from the floor, a can, a vase, a glass… “ten years spent photographing only a soup tureen…”

Concentration and sequences of images are the peculiar aspects of his work, recalling the form of prayer in which the uninterrupted and almost infinite repetition of the same word empties it of its primary meaning and transforms it into pure sound, creating a direct contact between self and the cosmos. In this regard, the obsessive attention Franco Vimercato pays to some objects is nothing other than an illustration of his striving towards the purity of the image.

In conjunction with the exhibition, the first monograph dedicated to Franco Vimercati is published by both Eskenazi/Skira Editore; it contains his more representative artworks and a long remarkable interview with  ElioGrazioli, read and approved by the artist himself.In addition to it, several writings by various authors retrace his career; among them Paolo Fossati, Luigi Ghirri, Angela Madesani, Giuseppe Panza di Biumo, Carlo Arturo Quintavalle, Daniela Palazzoli.

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Curator: Elio Grazioli
Layout: Daniela Ferretti

Annamaria Zanella.
Oltre l’ornamento

A refined and never commonplace artist, Annamaria Zanella presents a wide-ranging selection of her most recent creations at Palazzo Fortuny. Iron, copper, steel, glass, wood, porcelain, paper, cement and more are her favourite materials. The same materials that through memories, emotions, thoughts and an extraordinary technical ability are transformed into precious forms and geometries narrating fragments of the artist’s personal life, going beyond the mere function of ornament.

With Annamaria Zanella’s jewellery we talk about a “poor jewel”, a definition which is also an oxymoron. We are facing to the mysterious objects that possess the charisma of the entire form while remaining faithful to the artistic jewellery, actually. “Poverty” can be found in pieces of metal sheet, corroded surfaces, shards of glass, iron scraps and in combinations of gold and silver, enamel treated with acids in order to revitalize the intention to undermine the ideology of ostentation as a valuable thing. In her works are the experience of the subjects to take the name and place of a brooch, a ring, a necklace; subjects which are willing to become significant again as if poverty would transform in luxury in the freedom of art, unique items made with the aim to surprise and create emotions. Annamaria Zanella does not work in the context of the “ready made” because her forms are born from pure invention.

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Exhibition curated by Daniela Ferretti

Béatrice Helg
Risonanze

The work of Swiss artist Béatrice Helg holds a unique place within the tradition of staged and constructed photography, first developed in the 1980s. Indeed her photographs are a far cry from hyperrealist or narrative pictures, from artificial reconstructions of scenes of everyday life; instead, her work features abstract forms and sceneries as well as luminous worlds.

For Orthodox believers, the icon is a window on the invisible. And this is the image that comes to mind when we consider Béatrice Helg’s abstract architecture and its vibrant, otherworldly silence. Right from her early works, the artist has long succeeded like no one else in combining matter and theatre, or reality and vision. With her great passion for scenography and architecture, influenced by the Russian avant-garde and constructivism, Helg creates monumental spaces in which sculpture, painting, environment, staging and most of all light are constantly interwoven.

More than anything else, light is the real material without which her work would not exist. Light is the ultimate medium that makes revelation possible. Using raw, salvaged materials such as corroded metal sheets, unevenly transparent glass plates, or paper, the artist constructs unlikely installations in her studio, poised in a fragile equilibrium. These sculptural and geometric shapes seem to float, suspended out of real time. They inhabit the space rather than occupying it as inert objects. Beatrice Helg’s tableaux seem to be haunted by the contradiction between light and darkness, ultimately giving way to infinity, to a quest for the absolute, or rather to a boundless search for inner mystery.

“Risonanze” is Helg first exhibition in an Italian Museum. It includes a selection of twenty-four colour works, many of them are unreleased photographs, specially created by the artist for Palazzo Fortuny.