GAMeC, Bergamo
1 October 2008 - 8 February 2009




1938 - 1965 The years of research

GAMeC – Galleria d’Arte Moderna e Contemporanea di Bergamo in partnership with the Galleria Nazionale d'Arte Moderna e Contemporanea di Roma will hold an exhibition dedicated to Giacomo Manzù, one of Italy's greatest twentieth-century sculptors, from 1 October 2008 to 8 February 2009 to mark the centenary of his birth.
Based on fifty or so of his works from public and private collections, GAMeC will focus on the central period of his activity, from 1938 to 1965, which was distinguished by profound iconographic development and the excellence of the plasticism of his sculpture.
Curated by M. Cristina Rodescalchi, director of the Galleria d'Arte Moderna e Contemporanea di Bergamo, and Marcella Cattaneo, an art historian, the exhibition will also benefit from a technical committee consisting of Maria Vittoria Marini Clarelli, Soprintendente della Galleria Nazionale d’Arte Moderna e Contemporanea di Roma, Livia Velani, and Marcella Cossu, director of the Manzù Collection in Ardea.

The works displayed will begin from his renowned series of Crucifixions produced between 1939 and 1942, and include the themes Manzù held most dear to him: female portraiture, which touched and involved him deeply, his engaging interpretations of the female nude, and the psychological rendition of the semblance of the personality of culture, to which he was attached by personal and professional relationships with such artists as Carlo Carrà, Cesare Brandi and Oskar Kokoschka.
His innovative iconography of the Cardinals, his meeting with Pope John XXIII, and the completion of the Door of Death for St Peter's Basilica are singled out as crucial moments in Manzù's artistic career. In particular the Vatican door, on which he worked from 1947 to 1964, became the epicentre of a poetics which, in its dialogue with tradition, turned away from academism to offer a vision of a reality in which human values and emotions are solidly coalesced.
The focus on his works from the period 1938–1965 aims to highlight the intensity of the Bergamasque sculptor's research, conducted through the theme of unambiguously representational art, which led him to become one of the most important figures in twentieth-century art.
The connection of the exhibition with the City of Bergamo's celebration in 2008 of the 50th anniversary of Pope John XXIII's election will underline how strongly Manzù's personal relationship with the pope influenced his work.

The catalogue, which is published by Electa, contains essays by Marcella Cattaneo, Marcella Cossu, M. Cristina Rodeschini, Marco Roncalli and Livia Velani that discuss the artistic and human sides of Manzù's life in the period between the 1930s and 1960s. Each of the works on display is described from the points of view of its conception and place in art history. The entire series has been photographed by Jacopo Ferrari.

A series of itineraries in Lombardy, linked to Manzù's life, will be drawn up for the exhibition by Silvia Carminati.

To highlight the sculptor's artistic life in Bergamo, a section of the exhibition will be held in the Palazzo Marinoni Barca in Clusone (BG), the home of the Museo Arte Tempo. The town, in the busy Seriana Valley, provided refuge to the artist and his family during World War II, and ensured him not only safety but also an open and supportive cultural climate that is reflected by the works exhibited.

On the occasion of the exhibition "Giacomo Manzù 1938-1965. Gli anni della ricerca," the project of the digitalisation and filing of materials relating to the sculptor for the period 1930-65 conserved at the Archivio Bioiconografico - Galleria Nazionale d'Arte Moderna di Roma and at the Raccolta Manzù at Ardea (Director, Marcella Cossu) will be presented. The filing system was produced using the GEA data management software, in use since 1999 at the Galleria Nazionale d'Arte Moderna in collaboration with the BAICR (cultural consortium of libraries, archives, and cultural institutions) within the scope of the project "Archivi del Novecento," the website for which can be consulted at (www.archividelnovecento.it).

At the same time that the Giacomo Manzù exhibition is held, the Galleria d'Arte Moderna e Contemporanea will present a retrospective of the creative work of Giacomo's son, Pio (1939–1969), an internationally known designer who specialised in the car industry.

All the exhibitions are organised by GAMeC, the founders of which are the Comune di Bergamo and TenarisDalmine, supported by Banca Popolare di Bergamo, Bonaldi S.p.A. and Confindustria Bergamo.

The exhibition Giacomo Manzù. 1938-1965 The Years of Research is made possible by the support of the main sponsor: Fondazione Banca Popolare di Bergamo onlus.


Biographical notes
Giacomo Manzù (Bergamo 1908–Ardea 1991) began working in a woodcarver's workshop at a very young age. In 1928 he decided to focus exclusively on sculpture. After a short trip to Paris he settled in Milan where he won his first important commission from the Catholic University. He exhibited in the Milano and Il Milione galleries and struck up friendships with artists and critics. In 1933–34 deep reflection led him to move away from the primitivism of his early work in favour of a more modern artistic language; influenced by the work of Medardo Rosso, he created his first works in wax. He had his first solo room at the Venice Biennial in 1938 and was represented at the Corrente exhibitions in Milan, which strongly countered the Novecento movement and the ideology of the Fascist regime. His marriage to Tina Oreni in 1939 brought a son, Pio, a future designer of international renown.
His work in the 1940s had a marked social streak, in particular against the war and the Nazi abuse of power. In 1941 he exhibited his Crucifixions at the Barbaroux gallery in Milan. This sacred theme became a symbol of anti-war sentiment and raised strong feelings in political and ecclesiastic circles. The war prompted him to move from Milan to Clusone in 1942, where he remained for about three years.
His work was presented in many exhibitions throughout his career in Italy and abroad and brought him many prizes, for example, the Sculpture Prize at the 1948 Venice Biennial, which he shared with Henry Moore. The attention of the critics immediately intensified and such people as Lamberto Vitali, Carlo Carrà, Cesare Brandi, Lionello Venturi, Giulio Carlo Argan and Carlo Ludovico Ragghianti began to write about him. He taught at the Accademia Albertina in Turin, the Accademia di Brera in Milan, and the summer academy in Salzburg, where he met his second wife, Inge Schabel: they eventually married in 1972.
In 1949 he won the competition to produce a door for St Peter's basilica, the initial theme of which (Triumph of Saints and Martyrs of the Church) was transmuted into the Door of Death. The door was inaugurated in 1964. Later came the Door of Love for Salzburg Cathedral (1955–68) and the Door of War and Peace for the church of St Lawrence in Rotterdam (1965–68). His graphical output included Grasses (1942) and the etchings for Virgil's The Georgics (1948). He also designed theatre sets and costumes, for Oedipus Rex by Stravinsky in 1965, Wagner's Tristan and Isolde in 1971, and Verdi's Macbeth in 1985.
Manzù died in 1991 and was buried the following year close to the Manzù Collection in Ardea, the museum opened in 1969 and donated ten years later to the Italian State on the sculptor's wishes.

Curator: M. Cristina Rodeschini, Marcella Cattaneo

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