Catalogue

Capturing the ironic component in works of visual art seems a foregone conclusion. History abounds with artists who have used this ingredient with blatant satirical, grotesque, paradoxical or clamorously provocative intentions, sometimes to the point of trivialising its subversive role.Wanting to go deeper, however, there is a more subtle, complex and conceptual mode that operates on the level of form even before that of the more immediately decipherable meanings. Where we least expect it, there may be hidden subterranean plots that require a second glance, because irony is often woven into the mesh of the work in front of us when it is not even rooted in the artist's attitude.We discover, then, that even in those authors in whom provocation seems more explicit and even shouted out, such as Cattelan or Koons, understanding all the nuances and reasons is an operation that requires distinctions.From the subversion of academic canons by the Impressionists, through the disturbing outcomes of Surrealism, to the undue postmodern appropriations, Francesco Poli recognises irony's academic dignity and accepts the challenge to show how it assumes a crucial function in the various stages of the avant-garde and contemporary art. More importantly, he provides the key to decrypting the ironic device so that it can unleash all its destructive and innovative charge.

In the Futurist manifesto Antitradition, published in 1913, Apollinaire reserved 'mer...de aux critiques'. Just over a hundred years later that j'accuse has retained, intact, its scandalous force. Where is criticism today? Condemned to a slow euthanasia, it has become a residual genre: the figure of the critic has been replaced by that of the curator.And yet, at a time when works of art have become increasingly cryptic, this practice linked to the origins of modernity would play a decisive role. In order not to allow the esotericism and volatility of so many current art experiences to exclude us from pleasure. And to create a feeling of proximity to creations that are not infrequently repulsive. But, in order to still make sense, criticism can only go back to its original reasons. To remodel, through words, the painted signs. Reaffirm the centrality of the work. Telling how a painting came into being and what it represents; what its author's objectives were; how he formed himself; what techniques he used; what relations he had with the society in which he acted; what symbols he referred to. And again: teaching one to see better what is in evidence, but also what hides in the shadows. Finally, not to let oneself be seduced by the myth of the eternal beginning, to give oneself as a restless history of the present. And, at the same time, as a 'partial, passionate, political' exercise (in Baudelaire's words). Critics such as Roberto Longhi and Lionello Venturi, Giulio Carlo Argan and Francesco Arcangeli, Cesare Brandi and Filiberto Menna, Giuliano Briganti and Emilio Villa, Germano Celant and Achille Bonito Oliva, Carla Lonzi and Lea Vergine, among others, have interpreted this philosophy with different and distant sensitivities and cultures. To the topicality of their lecture is dedicated Armi improprie. Which suggests an exciting journey through ideas, theories, books, articles, projects, exhibitions, corsair experiences. Thus drawing the outlines of a possible canon of 20th century Italian art criticism.

The Stele of Kaminia, preserved at the National Archaeological Museum in Athens, is one of the three most illustrious inscriptions of antiquity that have guided generations of Italians to the Hellas in search of the past.Created in the 6th century B.C. as a tomb marker, and recovered between 1883 and 1885 on the island of Lemno, it was originally a couple of metres high but today only the upper half remains, with the profile of a man holding a spear and shield, who had distinguished himself in society for his virtues as a fighter. Around the figure and on the right side of the stone, two hundred letters of the Greek alphabet were engraved: a total of thirty-three words on eleven lines written in alternating directions, from top to bottom and then from bottom to top, or from right to left and then vice versa. But the language written in Greek is neither Greek nor Indo-European and belongs to the same family as Etruscan and Rhaetic, which was spoken and written in an area on the borders of Austria, Switzerland and Germany.Archaeologists, historians and linguists dealing with the Kaminia stele and its context are grappling with an unresolved question. Indeed, the question is whether the inhabitants of Lemno, as witnessed by the stele and other inscriptions, are of the same lineage as the Etruscans who migrated from Anatolia, with one group settled in Lemno and another arriving in Etruria, or whether they were Etruscans who came to Lemno from Italy to establish a colony or trading station and pirates in the Aegean. It is not easy to know what happened. The community that wrote on stone and terracotta in the Lemnian language is indistinguishable from other possible social and ethnic groups on the island, with whom they may have shared the same material and figurative culture, technologies, religious and funerary rites, and ways of life. If the Tyrrhenians of Lemno came from Etruria, they did not maintain contact with the motherland, according to the complete absence of objects manufactured in Italy. For the hypothesis of migration from Anatolia, we are completely unaware of the place of origin, culture and traditions. «No one has seen the truth, there is only opinion» (Simonide di Ceo).The history of the stele, and of the people of which it was an expression, is narrated in this book, which presents four texts signed by Carlo De Domenico, Riccardo Di Cesare, Germano Sarcone and Emanuele Papi, director of the Italian Archaeological School of Athens, in addition to the introduction by Emanuele Papi.

Misunderstanding is part and parcel of human relationships, and when those communicating are Erwin Panofsky, the foremost theorist of medieval and Renaissance iconology, and Barnett Newman, exponent and leading theorist of Abstract Expressionism, disaster is assured. Especially if no one is willing to come to terms.A controversy around the term 'sublime' gives the go-ahead for a much broader reflection on the state of aniconic art. In the United States in particular, it announced itself as completely alien not only to the figurative tradition and the categories of formal beauty and European-style classicism, but also to the abstract art of the Old Continent itself. The main objective of American abstractionism was to free itself from all proportions and the rigidity of form and geometry, without renouncing content, an aspect that critics and theorists such as Panofsky found difficult even to imagine.In this anthology of essays, edited by Pietro Conte, the positions of supporters and detractors of that current emerge, which set as its goal the constant search, the attempt to arouse terror mixed with pleasure, with the loss of all coordinates and fixed points, still expressing, but in a completely new way, the sublime.

That of the Etruscans is a culture that has long remained mysterious and has never ceased to gain the attention of scholars of all eras. Open to the decisive Greek and oriental influences, but also projected towards the neighboring populations of central and northern Italy, it managed to make its echo reach beyond the Alps.Of this people, Sybille Haynes outlines the peculiar character and follows the historical evolution, accompanying readers among the most significant and fascinating places, finds and testimonies. Through a vast repertoire of sources it reconstructs their life and death, religion, language, architecture, art and much more: in particular the female condition is investigated with unprecedented attention. In fact, from the dedicated in-depth studies, it emerges that Etruscan women, at least those of the upper class, enjoyed substantial equality of social consideration compared to men and a freedom that was anything but usual in antiquity.A journey through images allows you to explore and closely observe the Etruscan world within an overall framework whose organization is marked by following the great stages of its history, from its origins to the Roman annexation, along all the moments of flowering, crisis and rebirth. A world which, placed at the center of the trade and influences of the Mediterranean, has been able to absorb, unify and pass on habits and customs to the origins of our culture.

Bilingual edition Ita/Eng Luigi Ontani is considered to be one of the most influential contemporary Italian artists, devoted to experimentation with many different media and tecniques: from photography to sculpture using a wide range of materials, from painting to performance art, with his celebrated tableaux vivants. The common thread of his practice is the unconventional, ironic character of his works, marked by mythopoeic echoes of Western and Eastern iconographic traditions. This publication is devoted to Ontani's site-specific intervention for the Fondazione Luigi Rovati Art Museum. Entrusted to his citationist and playful inspiration, the room with cyclamen-colored walls is decorated with a pictorial cycle of six "ibridoli etruschi" as Ontani himself calls them, for their journey towards fullness of form consists exactly in a process of multiple hybridizations: the attributes and the symbols of divinity as elements of a play of combinations that is the very life of that which is infinite, its visual pulse, the rhythm of its heart. By practicing active imagination, Ontani produces forms that appear to have been generated by an ancestral and impersonal memory, capable of drawing on the mystical level of experience in which the object of the memory consists in what is still to happen – as if their mind travelled in a sort of imminent past. Through the visionary tale of Emanuele Trevi - who together with Ontani undertook a physical and imaginative journey in the footsteps of the Etruscans - the creative process and its ingredients are retraced, the relationship with the models, the 'ars combinatoria and the polymorphic link with countless artistic traditions.

Class of '92, artist and sex worker Sophia Giovannitti tells it like it is. She proudly signs her name both in artistic performances and when meeting clients. She does not hide behind a puritanical sense of guilt: free of prejudice, she does not allow anyone to degrade her for the way she has chosen to live.Inhabiting a world where capitalism has ended up commodifying not only our free time, but also those activities that have always been considered intimate and sacred, namely art and sex, has made it possible for someone to make money from both, creating a short circuit for which, despite fully participating in the system, one is still mercilessly stigmatised. We are all bent to the market logic that controls every aspect of our lives, and yet there are those who have raised their heads, those who, from the margins, exploit this very mechanism to reclaim their space, whether in the gallery or in the bedroom, and remain uncomfortable to the hypocritical and well-considered world. Sophia then continues on her way, the best that allows her to pursue what she loves and also profit from it. In an ironic 'confessional' style, she lays bare her occupations, giving them extreme seriousness and legitimacy. Rough, brash, provocative, capable of quoting The Sopranos and Foucault in a loose and self-conscious manner, Sophia Giovannitti writes a book that is more than contemporary: a necessary reflection on the markets of art, work and sex as they were, as they are and as one dreams they will be tomorrow.

The catalog is published in Italian with English text attachedThe exhibition “Etruscan Treasures. The Castellani Collection Between History and Fashion” (25 October 2023 – 3 March 2024), hosted at the Luigi Rovati Foundation and organized in collaboration with the Museo Nazionale Etrusco di Villa Giulia, brings to Milan the most important archaeological finds and extraordinary jewels of the Castellani collection, one of the richest and best-known Roman antiquarian collections, not only for the importance of the objects that compose it, but also for the relevance of the personalities who contributed to its creation during the nineteenth century.The name of the Castellani family is linked both to the invention of a new genre of jewelery and goldsmithery "in the style of the ancients", which imitated materials of archaeological origin in appearance and techniques, and to an intense activity of collecting and trading antiquities from the Peninsula, culminating in 1926 with the transfer of the largest core of the collection to the Museo Nazionale Etrusco di Villa Giulia.The possibility of exhibiting a selection of these objects, for the first time exceptionally outside their premises, allows us to appreciate not only the great variety of materials, but also the singular quality, which had long made the Castellani studio an obligatory stop for visitors to the Eternal City.The catalog follows the exhibition itinerary by presenting the works exhibited in the following sections: “Masterpieces”, “Mediterranean Productions”, “Women’s Life”, “Jewellery”, “Gods and Heroes” and “The Castellani Family”. With texts by Maria Paola Guidobaldi, Antonella Magagnini, Daniel Neumann, Valentino Nizzo, Giulio Paolucci, Giuseppe Sassatelli, Annalisa Zanni, the catalog is enriched by important contributions that add several new features to what was already known about the historical importance of the Castellani collection and on its characteristics, with particular attention to its intertwining of ancient and modern.

The cat – that most elegant, stubborn and artful of creatures – has been a subject favoured by artists of every culture and period since time immemorial. The spectacular stone carving created in Libya 7,000 years ago is possibly the earliest depiction of a cat fight, marking the beginning of a long uninterrupted visual tradition. A profusion of images that is not always matched by unequivocal sentiments for the cat which, while being among the most blessed of domestic animals, has often been a victim of hate and persecution over the centuries. From sacred animal in ancient Egypt to deterrent for rodents in the Babylonian civilization, an ally of man against the fatal bite of the viper, valued for its hunting prowess and immortalized as a good hunting companion, the cat gradually relinquished such practical activities to become the lazy friend of man, who opened the doors of his home to it. The cohabitation did not, however, last long and the relationship went through further ups and downs. At the end of the Middle Ages cats were mainly seen as the maleficent companion of the devil, a view that coincides with the sinister role allocated to it in paintings. It rarely, if ever, appears as protagonist in the work of the great masters but rather as a mere accessory, curled up at the feet of a female figure. It would have to wait for the arrival of Victorian sentimentalism before it could make a come-back, when this radical change in status saw it portrayed in intimate family scenes. This was the best time to be a cat, a golden age both for the affectionate relationship with its human companion and for the central role it played in works of art, where it is finally master of the scene. The greatest zoologist of our time, aware of every feline nuance, writes about history of art through the lens of cat-loving artists. For Pablo Picasso it was a symbol of ruthless violence, depicted as a fierce predator; for Balthus it was the supreme emblem of female sexuality; it was a very popular subject among cartoonists and caricaturists and used by Banksy as a vehicle for political protest.  The cat is an inexhaustible source for visual exploration and flights of fancy.

Architect, designer and photographer, Ettore Sottsass (1917-2007) left a profound mark on the international design scene with his unmistakable visual vocabulary, made up of unprecedented combinations of materials and unprejudiced research into colour.After his prolific association with Olivetti, he became an avant-garde icon in the 1980s with the Memphis Group, before devoting himself entirely to architecture. His indispensable freedom, in work as in life, is accompanied by an insatiable curiosity that leads him to explore places and cultures, instilling the same enthusiasm in all his collaborators. A rich introduction by Emmanuel Berard and a self-portrait written and drawn by Sottsass himself, together with photographs and projects, restore the fascinating and restless creative path of a great master of Italian design, still a reference point for new generations.

Architect, designer and emblematic figure of modernity, Charlotte Perriand (1903-1999) devoted her life to the art of living. After a long association with Le Corbusier, she developed a uniqueness of vision with which she succeeded in imposing herself in an all-male world. A passionate militant and audacious designer, she worked to make the iconic objects accessible to all, whose criteria of utility, functionality and beauty revolutionised the history of 20th century design by combining the use of natural materials and industrial production.Through a rich selection of images, a text by Anne Bony and an afterword by Kengo Kuma, the book traces the extraordinary parable of a free and independent woman, whose example is more relevant than ever.

Starting with the emblems bequeathed by Duchamp to the second half of the 20th century, the machine and the star, this volume presents three mini-essays on the theme of inspiration and its intermittencies. Beginning with the works of Marcel Duchamp, Jasper Johns and Alighiero Boetti, Michele Dantini sheds new light on the metaphor of the artist as ‘machine’, on the disappearance of the creative process as an orderly professional routine that had traditionally characterised the transposition of the ‘idea’ into image. A turning point that is in some ways liberating, but also harbinger of alarming implications, experienced in all their urgency by the ‘informal’ generation: how to protect oneself from the discontinuity of ‘inspiration’, how to confer duration to inner time, if everything is resolved in the unrepeatable exceptionality of the moment? Dantini analyses step by step the 'reinvention' of the artist's craft: the curious adoption of readymades to restore plausibility and vigour to traditional techniques, the indefinite dilation of execution times; the practice of the art of repetition and the creation of satisfying routines thanks to 'automatic', impersonal and even delegable procedures. It is up to the 'miserable spectator' and his acuity to grasp in the works a continuity in transition, to reconstruct the underlying metaphors and 'interpret a routine suddenly revealed to be devoid of recognisable techniques and references'.