Housed in the Palazzo delle Belle Arti (Palace
of Fine Arts) 1908/11 by Cesare Bazzani
(1873/1939). Established in 1883 at the Palazzo
delle Esposizioni (Exhibitions' Palace) in Via Nazionale and then moved
here in 1915
Enlarged in 1934 again by Bazzani and in
2004 by Roger Diener
Since World War Two for over thirty years
the museum was managed by Palma Bucarelli
The works in the Gallery belong to the
nineteenth and twentieth century
There are about 1,100 works on display and
about 3,300 more kept in the vaults of the museum
FRIEZES
In the center “The artist and the artistic battles” by Giovanni Prini (1877/1958)
On the right
“Boat - Wall of Europe” 1979 by Fabio Mauri
(1926/2009) e “Big Spiral” 1962 by Ettore Colla
(1896/1968)
On the left “Peace
on Earth” by the Lithuanian by Jacques Chaim Lipchitz (1891/1973) and “Roma 2010”
2011 by Mauro Staccioli (1937) from Volterra
Across the street from the Gallery there
are the STEPS OF VILLA BORGHESE 1911 by Cesare Bazzani
COURT OF SATURNALIA
The huge group received an award at the
Paris Universal Exhibition of 1900 and earned the sculptor from the Frosinone
area the coveted Legion of Honor
Nevertheless, the striking sculpture with
ten characters in real life size is not appreciated and it is indeed almost
completely hidden in the courtyard by a tropical plant
COURT OF THE ROMANS
Group of bronze, marble and limestone “The
Romans (Triumph of Germanicus)” about 1899 by Francesco
Jerace (1854/1937)
“The angry” 1884 by Mario Rutelli (1859/1943)
Bronze statue “Sad motherhood” 1887 by Emilio Marsili (1841/1926)
Photographical installation on the
counter façade:
Sculptures:
“The group represents allegorically the
theme of progress (the wheel). (...) The personification of idealism (the woman
soaring) and the rampant materialism (the running man) are accompanied by
Masonic symbols as the head of Minerva, the branches of oak and laurel
intertwined, the owl, the horse's head and the monkeys, placed at the base and
on the back of the sculpture, alluding to the wisdom, the glory and the greed
of man” (Stefania Frezzotti)
Installation “Steps”
2011 by Alfredo Pirri (1957)
“Within this work, I feel suspended in the
absence of gravity, raised from the same soil that I trample. I perceive to be
in a warm place, filled with inert memory, and at the same time in a cold
place. I feel infinite in the middle of a great complexity” (Vicenzo Altaio)
“Euclid”
1883 by Giacomo Ginotti (1845/97)
“From his studies he had derived a
naturalism still tinged with a romantic sensitivity. His most famous work, Eve
after the Sin, depicting a naked young woman collapsed with a dramatic gesture,
enjoyed a certain appreciation for his captivating conventionality” (Stefania
Frezzotti)
Statues
by Alfonso Balzico (1825/1901):
“Norma” 1884/86, “The Happiness (The Owl)”
about 1858, “Elvira” 1884/86, “The Poor” 1856/60, “Juliet” 1884/86, “The
Sleepwalker” 1884/86, “The Lost (the Naïve)” 1856/60, “The Avenger” 1856/60
Provocative works now considered historical
that have provoked negative reactions for their eccentric diversity, far from
the canons of the figurative tradition
They are, however, all works
of artists famous all over the world and that this exhibition tries
successfully to contextualize in the heart of the museum, at the center of a
historical-artistic journey encompassing two hundred years
By Alberto Burri
(1915/95):
“He is the Italian artist with Lucio
Fontana, to have given the greatest Italian contribution to the international
art scene after World War II. His research goes from painting to sculpture with
the sole end of the investigation of the expressive qualities of matter. This
makes him fully occupy a place of pride in the trend known as 'informal'“
(Francesco Morante - www.francescomorante.it)
By Piero Manzoni
(1933/63):
“Some of his debunking works as 'Artist's
Shit' (produced in 90 copies in 1961) entered the collective imagination, like
Duchamp's upside down urinal. The conception of Manzoni's art recalls the
inventions of the Dada movement” (Martina De Luca)
By Lucio Fontana
(1899/1968):
“In 1949 he created the first 'holes', to
which he gave the title of Spatial Concepts, namely 'the new concept of seeing
the mental fact'. Puncturing the canvas 'which was the basis of all arts' he
created 'a new infinite dimension..., corresponding to the cosmos ... And the
cuts'- continued the artist -'the hole really..., it was not the destruction of
the framework, the informal gesture... it was just a dimension beyond the
framework, freedom of understanding art through any means, through any form'“ (Alessandra Ponente -
Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani Treccani)
“Ready-made” art by Marcel Duchamp (1887/1968):
“Obligations pour la roulette-de
Monte-Carlo” 1924
“Boîte en valise” 1936/41
“Apolinère enameled” 1965 second series,
from a unique original of 1916/17
“3 stoppage - étalon” 1964
“In advance of the broken arm” 1915
“Pliant de voyage” 1916
“Porte-chapeau” 1964 from original of 1917
“Trébuchet” from original of 1917
“Air de Paris” from original of 1919
“Fresh widow” 1920
“Paysage à Blainville” 1902
One of the versions of “Fountain” from the lost original of 1917
He was one of the most important and
influential artists of the XX century. In December 2004, Duchamp's Fountain was
voted the most influential artwork of the 20th century by 500 selected British
art world professionals
“Futurism was the impressionism of the
mechanical world. (...) I was not interested in this. (...) I wanted to make
sure that the painting would serve my purpose and I wanted to get away from its
physical side. I was interested in the ideas not only visual products. I wanted
to return the painting to the service of the mind. (...) In fact, up to a
hundred years ago all the painting had been literary or religious: it had all
been in the service of the mind. During the last century this feature was lost
little by little. The more sensual charm offered a painting - the more
animalistic it was - all the more it was appreciated. (...) Painting should not
only be retinal or visual, should have to do with the gray matter of our
understanding” (Marcel Duchamp)
By Emilio Vedova (1919/2006):
Venetian artist friend of the composer
Luigi Nono, whose twelve-tone music has many similarities with the fierce
artistic expression of Vedova
"Painting
becomes gestural expression, functional to translate firmly on a pictorial
space the sense of living in the contemporary world. (...) The expressive power
of the pictorial gesture, evident in the brushstrokes spread wide and fast for
the entire composition, communicates strongly a desire to participate, which is
renewed from moment to moment, to the
drama of contemporary life" (Francesca Sborgi - Catalog of the exhibition
Bellezza Divina)
By Ettore Colla
(1896/1968):
“Industrial Divinity” 1966
“The sculptor collects metal scrap from
deposits in the outskirts of the city, useless waste of industrial machinery.
In this first period these are mainly materials coming mostly from the ruins of
war, constituting a significant and dramatic testimony. After choosing some
pieces the artist mounts them together seconding, during the operation, the
creative image that the object 'found' suggests. This type of transaction has
its antecedent in the Dadaist poetry. The action of Colla, however, is based on
a creative process that moves away from every casuality and automatism in its
strict discipline, in its referring to specific criteria both manual and
conceptual” (Nicoletta Cardano - Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani Treccani)
In
the room there are also:
"The work was created for the Venice Biennale in
1966. Before arriving at the gallery the ‘Wall’ was exhibited at the Lumière et
Mouvement exhibit held at the Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris in 1967.
Soto's research explores lighting effects and the interrelation between the
vertical elements that often are part of his works" (Mariastella Margozzi)
“Up
- Tempo” 1957 by Mimmo Rotella
(1918/2006) from Calabria
“No
title” 1965 by the American John Chamberlain
(1927)
“The Gift” 1990 by the American Joseph Kosuth (1945)
“Bandes” 1969 by the French Daniel Buren
(1938)
“The acid tone of the chromatic rendition,
the elongated shape of the figure, which hark back to sixteenth-century
Venetian tradition of El Greco and Tintoretto, as well as the solid draughtsmanship
of the painting struck his contemporaries who saw in the young Afro an already
mature talent” (Maura Picciau)
Pastel on paper “Self-portrait” about 1880
by Antonio Mancini (1852/1930)
“Antonio Mancini paints between 1878 and
1882 many self-portraits. These were the years of mental illness, the artist
portrays himself always in front and half-length, but with endless variations
of expressions and hairstyles, as if to record the different stages of madness”
(Martina De Luca)
“Self-taught, not highly educated, perhaps,
but sensitive to the influences of Pre-Raphaelites and Impressionism, Armando
Spadini was for many years after his death, an important reference point for
the painters of the younger generation, at least until, in the decades of
second World War, a more intellectual trend took over that declassified
Spadini's work as too intimate and too tied to everyday life” (Luca Ceccarelli)
“It represents the Roman art scene in the
early eighties in the form of a modern Parnassus. The painter portrays, besides
himself, Luigi Ontani, Mario Merz, Cy Twombly, Sandro Chia, Francesco Clemente
and inserts quotes from the works of Paolini, Kounellis, De Dominicis. Gallery
owners and critics also appear as Gian Enzo Sperone and Mario Diacono, while
Achille Bonito Oliva, dressed as a Roman emperor, dominates the left side of
the scene” (GNAM Website - www.gnam.beniculturali.it)
In a glass
case in the center of the room:
"Aspen Leaf" 1993 by
the Austrian artist Greta Schödl (1929)
At the end of the corridors three installations:
"In
the opening
of the simulated gates time is not
considered; the juncture that
is in the shot of the image is eternal. The precision and detail of
the frames simulate
the doors, in wood or travertine,
which give access to the exhibition areas. The deception camouflage is complete, and for
the viewer to discover the
element alien to the context, the intruder, becomes a game, a
challenge and a call of attention.
The research on the historical archives
of Marina Paris, in dialogue with
the architectural and aesthetic soul of our lives as
citizens, thus enters into an
institutional place - the home par excellence of the art of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries -
to play with as many icons of architecture, such
as St. Ivo alla Sapienza, the Oratorio dei Filippini and the State Archives in the Eur district" (Ilaria Piccioni
- www.seroxcult.com)
For
this and for the following three rooms the suggested itinerary does not
coincide with the numbers of the rooms
“The painting portrays his daughter Gina and
the sculptor Nino Franchina, who became husband and wife at the time of the
painting. (...) It clearly cites the 'Portrait of the spouses' (Pacuvio and his
wife) from Pompeii, stopping in an image posted a time of deep emotion, to
perpetuate the memory” (Maura Picciau)
“Self-portrait” about 1831 by Natale Schiavoni (1777/1858)
“A work of sculpture in which the message
passes through a language based on the rejection of every canon of ideal
beauty: the deformities in the bodies of miners carrying a fallen comrade take
to the extreme formal consequences its realism direct and brutal in some ways”
(Carlo Bertelli, Giuliano Briganti, Antonio Giuliano)
“Emigrants” 1896 by the Tuscan Angelo Tommasi (1858/1923)
“Naturalistically and minutely descriptive
in the crowded groups of figures on the pier sadly awaiting boarding at the
port of Livorno. It is precisely the exceptional size of the painting to make
it an epic and monumental representation of the era of Italian emigration. The
large size combined with its lack of appreciation enjoyed by the work in the
past, has meant that the Emigrants were not given proper placement in the
exhibition halls before the last display” (Elena di Majo)
Four important paintings by Balla, Simi,
Kandinsky and Burri presented with words, music, thermoformed reproductions
through auditory, tactile, olfactory and emotional perception
Bronze statue “G.B. Niccolini” 1864 by Augusto Rivalta (1837/1925)
“Gemito's work comes at a time of transition
from the classical tradition of sculpture characterized by smooth and polished
surfaces to the use of a vibrant molded technique, obtained with rough surfaces
where the light produces effects similar to those produced by the Macchiaioli
Tuscan painters” (Carlo Bertelli, Giuliano Briganti, Antonio Giuliano)
Guido Baccelli (1830/1916) was Minister of
Education and established the National Gallery of Modern Art
Representation of the Aragno Coffee Bar in
Rome, a place of meeting of the editorial staff of “Plastic Values” and a
meeting place for artists and writers
Wonderful expressionistic portrait of the great
poet, friend of the unfortunate artist who died of tuberculosis at the untimely
age of 29
“Self-portrait” about 1943 by Francesco Menzio (1899/1979)
Sibilla Aleramo was an Italian writer and
poet very active in the feminist movement
“The sculpture of Ungaretti was done in a
few months on a block of walnut wood, whose hardness offered the sculptor the
chance to get a barbaric, chipped surface and compact volumes” (Maura Picciau)
“Self-portrait” 1942 by Mario Mafai (1902/65)
This portrait cleverly investigates the
psychology of one of the greatest Italian poets of the twentieth century
Portrait of the celebrated Italian
playwright painted by his son Fausto, a talented and significant painter
