INTERNATIONAL MUSEUM DAY 2022
For International Museum Day 2022, the Istituto centrale per la grafica is launching a section of its website dedicated to in-depth information in English on the works on display in the exhibition Acquisizioni 2019 – 2022.
The virtual exhibition will be periodically implemented with new content and curiosities that will be accessible via QR code in the exhibition or by remote, continuing reading this section.
EXHIBITION ITINERARY
FIRST ROOM
The exhibition opens with 20th century graphic art and photography. The works on display testify to the collecting taste and the artistic and popular activity of two leading figures in the study and promotion of ancient and modern graphic art: Carlo Alberto Petrucci (1881-1963) and Alfredo Petrucci (1888-1969), who respectively directed the Calcografia and the Gabinetto Nazionale delle Stampe in the period between the two wars and in the early years of the economic boom. Among other works, visitors can admire works by Umberto Prencipe, Luigi Bartolini, Anselmo Bucci and Duilio Cambellotti, and a rare tanka, an unpublished poetic composition by Harukichi Shimoi (1883-1954). Photography is represented by some iconic portraits by Ghitta Carell and by some prints by authors who well testify both to the modernist tendencies of Italian photography (Bruno Stefani and Riccardo Moncalvo) and to the photoreportage of the 1960s-1970s (Calogero Cascio, Antonio Sansone, Fausto Giaccone and Mario Dondero), with images recalling some salient moments in the history of the last century. Alongside the photographs, a selection of volumes from Luigi Albertini’s photographic library is presented, especially dedicated to documentary photography and international photojournalism of the twentieth century
SECOND ROOM
The second room of the exhibition is dedicated to the artworks arrived at ICG through legal istruments, with which the Ministry of Culture carries out its protective action. One of these is compulsory purchase, to prevent the permanent exit of the artworks from the national territory; this is the case of the most representative drawing of the exhibition, Egon Schiele’s watercolor Sitzender Männerakt, 1910, an absolute rare presence, considering that works by this artist are hardly represented in the Italian public collections
In this room we also see two major preparatory studies by Luigi Ademollo made in 1786, representing the Alexander the Great’s conquests, to be related perhaps to the melodrama by Metastasio Alessandro nell’Indie, performed in Rome in 1787.
Alberto Martini and Mario Sironi drawings were purchased with state funds for XXth century art.
An interesting drawing representing a theatrical scene inspired by the new urban planning of Piazza del Popolo in Rome commissioned by Pope Alessandro VII Chigi, and a battle scene by Guglielmo Cortese, known as Borgognone, preparatory drawing for the fresco painted in 1657 for the throne room of the Quirinale Gallery in Rome are also on display in this room.
THIRD ROOM
In the third and last room of the exhibition, contemporary works are exhibited, heterogeneous both in terms of typology and technique.
You can admire art editions, by Stamperia Albicocco, by ‘Edizioni del Ragazzo innocuo’ or by ‘Associazione culturale La luna‘, in which the printed works of masters such as Emilio Vedova, Mario Ceroli and Luciano Ragozzino are accompanied by poetic texts or literature by Mario Luzi, Valerio Magrelli, Massimo Cacciari and many others.
Among the loose sheets on display a large pastel drawing by Nunzio, the delicate drawings by Marisa Albanese and the prints by Nikè Arrighi Borghese and Cascione & Lusciov.
Also noteworthy are the photographs by Lisetta Carmi, some of which are collected in a single art edition.
The artists of the latest generations are still represented with an edition produced in the Institute’s printing house by Helen Cammock, with a large drawing engraved on carbon paper by Marta Roberti and with a video by Andrea Martinucci.
The works in this room entered the collection thanks to gifts, purchases or calls supported by the Direzione Generale for Contemporary Creativity of the Ministry of Culture, or through special projects in collaboration with other public and private institutions.