THE BEL PAESE OF ART
The Ethics and Aesthetics of Italy
Curators: Giacinta Di Pietrantonio and Maria Cristina Rodeschini Galati
GAMeC- Galleria d'Arte Moderna e Contemporanea in Bergamo
28 September 2011 - 29 January 2012
The collective exhibition entitled "The Bel Paese of Art" is being promoted by GAMeC - Galleria d'Arte Medema e Contemporanea in Bergamo to celebrate the 150th anniversary of the Italian unification.
It investigates the idea of country or nation, and the cultural, social and aesthetic processes that characterize its formation. Through works by artists active in Italy and abroad, as well as an examination of things and events from the 19th century through today, the exhibition showcases Italy's image around the world in the multifaceted expressions of visual art and its derivatives, up to the formation of Italian design, in a taut dialogue between the elite culture and the popular one. Alongside the numerous forms that the Italian identity has acquired internationally, the exhibition explores the places and moments that have helped mould the nation-state as a unified entity: its flag, national anthem, borders, map, religious culture, monuments, sports and memory, through works that mimic or define ways of representing politics, aesthetics, geography, the landscape, symbols and identity. Several of these artists go beyond the limitations of the artistic object and engage directly with reality and the structures pertaining to it, both tangible and symbolic.
The idea of artistic creation that thus coincides with the practical organization of everyday life is rooted not only in historical examples ranging from memory to architecture and the birth of design as a modern fusion of ethics and aesthetics, but also in the moments of epochal transformation that, over the centuries, have distinguished the creation of national states. Particularly in Italy, these moments of unification are enacted through the internal and external sharing of the culture and art of the Bel Paese. Italy is unanimously identified as the nation of art or, rather, of the arts, the quintessential place of continuity and a unique aesthetic sense that touches every part of life.
Consequently, each room will also feature objects that are not works of art but constitute world-famous icons of the Italian identity. Their inclusion will enrich the exhibition through the comparison of the pure ideal of an avant-garde art and the testimony of spontaneous, popular or industrial creativity.
Furthermore, each room will showcase projects by artists for Italian venues they have chosen, such as Accardi for Santa Maria Novella, Shozo Shimamoto in San Gimignano, Odenbach in Saturnia, Irwin in Florence, Zvezdotchetov in San Tomato, Alviani in Fasano, Vautier in Naples, Opie, Prigov and Pirri in Rome, Paladino in Palermo, Delvoye in Portofino, Trockel in Polignano, Armleder in Piacenza - Po River, Gillick in Bergamo, Bullock in Milan, Chia in Monza, and Pisani, Steinbach and Rotella in Venice.