Frenologia della vanitas
Il teschio nelle arti visive
Death has always deeply fascinated mankind, a source of angst that has dominated artworks and the human imagination since time immemorial. Every era abounds with symbols for the transient nature of our earthly existence, but one stands out above all: the skull, that often “meditative” simulacrum that warns us of the futility of all worldly things and forces us to ponder the meaning of life. The definitive emblem of Vanitas, the skull crops up in Medieval imagery, topping off putrefying bodies that lie in wait for careless wayfarers. Stripped of its flesh, down to the bare bone, in the Renaissance the skeleton began the rise towards its seventeenth century pinnacle. Yet subsequently this image encountered varying fortunes. In the eighteenth century it lost most of its macabre connotations with the resurgence of subgenres connected to the memento mori, yet without dissipating its power. And while in the nineteenth century it made a half-hearted return, it was in the twentieth century that it regained much of its previous popularity. The turn of the millennium saw it on the crest of the wave, with skulls and skeletons once more dominating the visual arts. However this exponential increase in popularity, in quantity rather than quality, did not automatically correspond to a renewed power: art appears to be inured to the point of insensitivity to the image of the skull. Inert, incapable of inspiring fear or imposing a moral agenda, the death’s head appears to have lost all its previous emphasis. This is the diagnosis reached by the author of Frenologia della vanitas after a long and complex exploration that seeks out unusual combinations and forges connections between past and present, styles and periods. The decision not to adopt a chronological structure or other forms of classification enables the arguments to develop rhizomatically, played out against the author’s underlying apprehension for the future of the skull.
Textual index
Premessa dell’autore - Craniologie, craniometrie & cranioscopie dell’arte
Liber mortuorum - Prolusione allo spazio e al tempo della vita
Mors certa, hora incerta - Vanitas e memento mori
Non omnis moriar - Esiste una clausola invariabile: “e poi morì!”
Tempus erit - Anche in Arcadia c’è morte
Sic transit gloria mundi - Le mostre sono dure a morire
Hic et nunc - Dal corpo verminoso al corpo secco
Reductus in pulverem - L’esilio della carne verso la cenere
Finis vitae, finis mundi - L’Apocalisse, costante ultima della morte
Mors omnia vincit - Tra danze e trionfi
Habeas vitam - Apologia della miseria umana
Cogitata mori - San Girolamo e Cesare Lombroso: viatico tra fede e razionalismo
Panopticon - L’argot criminale
Caput mortuum - All-Hallows-Eve: alla vigilia di Ognissanti
Cogitata species - Essere o non essere, tutto il resto è silenzio
In saecula saeculorum - Finché morte non vi separi (per poi ricongiungervi)
Contemptus mundi - Le nature silenziose
In articulo mortis - Simboli d’opulenza e di lordura
Opus magnum, omnia vanitas - Teschi lumeggianti
Imago mortis - Jan Fabre, l’entomologo
Adoratio mortis - I teschi di cristallo
Similia similibus curantur - Dall’Homo erectus al computer preistorico
R.I.P. (Requiescat in pace) - Effemeridi spiritiche
Conditio sine qua non - Sui cervi volanti
Plus salis quam sumptus - Lusso sfrenato – La posterità di Hirst
Imponderabilia - A proposito di “quel che luccica”
Post hominem vermis, post vermem foetor et horror - L’essere morti non ci dà riposo
Modus vivendi - Autoritratto con teschio
Ars longa, vita brevis - Guardare la morte in faccia
Neapolis - Vedi Napoli e poi muori
Mens sana in corpore sano - Una risata ci seppellirà tutti
Humor melancholicus - Il quarto temperamento dell’alchimia
Ars sine scientia nihil est - (Scheletriche) “prospettive curiose”
Disiecta membra - Sangue chiama sangue
Tempus facit experientiam - La fragile eternità di Quinn
Nomina sunt omina - Equivoco illegittimo: teschio o cranio?
Cogito ergo sum - Pensare (e osare dire) il teschio
Morituri inter mortuos - Polverose epigrafi
De mortuis nihil nisi bonum - Ossari e altri offici funerari
Principium individuationis - Fine Ottocento, primo Novecento
Miraculum mortuorum - Terzo millennio, la legge del rendimento crescente
Mixtum compositum - I plurimi possibili dell’arte contemporanea
Variatis variandis - “Autunno” cinese
Currit ferox aetas - Restano solo le ossa
Respice finem - L’etno-antropologia di Barceló
Josaphat - Bisogni indotti, o della pantomania funebre
Vox populi - L’immaginario popolare
Omnia mors aequat - Dal Jolly Roger al Pericolo di morte
Homo immortalis - Il caso De Dominicis
Viriditas - Bugie e sofismi
De profundis - L’asprezza delle radiografie
Theatrum mundi - La fotografia: temps révolu
Requiem (aeternam dona eis, Domine) - Negli aggregati d’ossa di Jiri Georg Dokoupil
Rara avis - Da furor (teutonico) a cenere
Post mortem - Postmodern
Finis coronat opus - Le ultime parole: commiato
Frenologia della vanitas
-
Read also
Like a virulent virus that spreads like wildfire, art collecting can lead those infected to authentic excesses like clearing out their homes to make room for works and spending entire fortunes through a longing for possession so strong as to become irresistible. What strikes the spark? A bent for financial speculation, pure intellectual delight or the desire to become someone by building up social prestige on the foundations of art. While there are many possible reasons and approaches, from militancy to passion, putting together a collection is in any case a pathway of self-knowledge and discovery. Il piacere dell’arte offers an overview of contemporary collecting in Italy, which has become an increasingly authoritative undertaking in recent times by virtue not only of the enterprise and initiative involved but also of the ever-greater planning that characterizes many collections. Starting from the fundamental historical background and an examination of the fertile terrain out of which outstanding figures like Giorgio Franchetti, Giuseppe Panza and Marcello Levi emerged and arriving at their contemporary counterparts, the book also seeks to identify the causes of the “lack of modernity” of Italian collecting, hampered by heritage restrictions and one of Europe’s highest rates of VAT. While these bureaucratic and fiscal impediments work on the one hand to obstruct dialogue with the institutions (unlike what happens across the Atlantic, where donations to museums are incentivized by tax relief), on the other they give rise to the strong development of private initiative and foster the opening of numerous foundations to the public. This is the most peculiar feature of the Italian panorama, a complex and multifaceted reality whose potential proves all the more interesting to examine by virtue of its social aspects and organic character.DiscoverMarianna Agliottone, Adriana Polveroni
Il piacere dell'arte
Pratica e fenomenologia del collezionismo contemporaneo in Italia
