February 18–June 25, 2018
Post Zang Tumb Tuuum. Art Life Politics: Italia 1918–1943 curated by Germano Celant, is an exhibition that explores the world of art and culture in Italy in the interwar years. Based on documentary and photographic evidence of the time, it reconstructs the spatial, temporal, social and political contexts in which the works of art were created and exhibited, and the way in which they were interpreted and received by the public of the time.
Between 1918 and 1943 Italy was marked by the crisis of the liberal state and the establishment of fascism, and by the ongoing interdependence of artistic research, social dynamics and political activity. The documents and photographs that prompted the selection of works in the exhibition offer a record of the artistic and cultural production of the period, taking into account the multifaceted contexts and settings in which it was exhibited: these include artists’ studios, private collections, large public events and exhibitions of Italian art both in Italy and abroad, architectural designs and city planning, graphic arts and the first examples of industrial furniture production. According to Germano Celant, the documentation found and presented in this exhibition “offers a summary of the communicative function of a work of art, and tells a real story that lies outside of the theoretical discourse of an artifact.”
The investigation was carried out in partnership with archives, foundations, museums, libraries and private collections and has resulted in the selection of more than 500 paintings, sculptures, drawings, photographs, posters, pieces of furniture, and architectural plans and models created by over 100 authors. In Post Zang Tumb Tuuum. Art Life Politics: Italia 1918–1943, these objects are displayed with period images, original publications, letters, magazines, press clippings, and private photographs in order to raise the issue of the decontextualization within any standard exhibition presentations, in which a work of art traditionally becomes a neutral, isolated object. If, on the other hand, the material and physical conditions of its original presentation are recreated, the opportunity is given not only to explore the complex relations between creators, gallerists, art critics, ideologues, politicians, collectors, patrons and viewers, but also to investigate the concept of the exhibition in its different forms, as a quintessential element in the range of the symbolic forms of the period. Furthermore, this approach underlines how the exhibition of national products and images—even in international settings—was used by the fascist regime as a flexible, adaptable, modern and practical means to reshape Italian people and mold their experience of the world.
The exhibition design, conceived by New York studio 2 x 4 in conjunction with the curator, provides an immersive experience consisting of 20 partial reconstructions of public and private exhibition rooms. These full-size recreations from period photographs contain original works by artists such as Giacomo Balla, Carlo Carrà, Felice Casorati, Giorgio de Chirico, Fortunato Depero, Filippo de Pisis, Arturo Martini, Fausto Melotti, Giorgio Morandi, Scipione, Gino Severini, Mario Sironi, Arturo Tosi, and Adolfo Wildt, among others.
Consideration of the contemporary social, political and vital context is provided by the exhibition’s presentation of architectural plans, urban planning and large official expositions like the Mostra della Rivoluzione fascista (1932), the Esposizione dell’Aeronautica Italiana (1934), the Mostra Nazionale dello Sport (1935) and the major design for the E42 project. The exhibition’s presentation is punctuated by thematic focuses dedicated to politicians, intellectuals, writers and thinkers that developed their own autonomy by actively participating in or remaining indifferent to the regime’s recommendations, or, in contrast, being subjected to or criticizing the impositions it meted out in the political, cultural and artistic domains.
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