Alighiero e Boetti
Voli pindarici
Genesi di un’opera


12.04 - 31.05.2023


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ALIGHIERO E BOETTI

VOLI PINDARICI
Genesi di un'opera


Curated by Guido Fuga
From an idea of  Diego Fuga

Opening 12/04/2023 h 17:00 > 20:00
12/04 > 31/05/2023*

Martelli Fine Art in collaboration with NP-ArtLab
Corso Monforte 23
Milan

*Private exhibition space
Tuesday-Thursday, 12.00 - 19.00
Or by appointment
For more information:
info@npartlab.com
francesca@martellifineart.com



"[...] Blue skies where hundreds of aeroplanes hover [...],  bring a wave of brilliant madness. There is no title and the authors are doubled, or rather tripled; Alighiero, Boetti and Fuga" wrote Maurizio di Puolo in the article Alighiero Boetti & Guido Fuga that appeared in "Il Messaggero" on 2 December 1977.
Alighiero Boetti began a large series of papers representing aeroplanes in that year, executed in different versions using pencil, watercolour and biro on paper.
As for other works, Boetti collaborates this time with the designer and architect Guido Fuga, a valuable and close collaborator of the famous cartoonist Hugo Pratt.
In this series conceived and executed with Fuga, Boetti gives us access to fundamental aspects of his poetics such as the perception between mobility and stability, between the finite and infinite worlds, which find space within a composition of figurative elements drawn in negative over a monochromatically coloured sky.
The observer is invited to enter this universe poised between the real and the imaginary with lightness, taking us back in time to a playful dimension that is closed to the imagination of childhood until we reach a depth of meaning based on the union-contrast between order and disorder.
The exhibition allows us to go back in time and rediscover the creative process and collaboration between Boetti and Fuga:  indeed, the designer gives us access to his personal archive, which consists of sketches on paper, preparatory materials for the creation of the Aerei series, posters, paper invitations and photographs from that period.
These works are presented in a totally new way and have never been collected in an exhibition since now. Among the works, there is Aereo su biro nera from 1977, one of the very first, if not the first, produced by the Boetti-Fuga collaboration.
Confirming Boetti's spirit of openness to collaborations in the exhibition there are some works made in relations with Alitalia, Twinings and Austrian Airlines (the project Cieli ad Alta Quota, a set of 6 puzzles designed in collaboration with Hans Ulrich Obrist).
"Voli Pindarici" is closely linked to a concept of travel, both real and imaginary, which replaces physical mobility with that of the imagination: first of all Arei, but also the postal works on display, like the American conceptual mail art. The idea of departure, but also of return, emerges within these stamped envelopes that expand the sense of time and space. On the handwritten envelopes addresses linked to the Boetti family create a connection with another artwork in the exhibition with a deep sentimental connection, which presents a play of numbers linked to the family's birth dates, 15 and 16, and in the background a series of aeroplanes wandering in the blue.


Biography
Alighiero Boetti
(1940-1994) – or Alighiero and Boetti as signed in 1971 – was born in Turin where he made his debut in the Arte Povera in January 1967.
In 1972 he moved to Rome, a context closer to his predilection for the South of the world. Already in the previous year he discovered Afghanistan and started the artistic work he entrusted to the Afghan embroiderers, including the Maps, the colored planispheres that he will propose over the years, as a register of political changes in the world.
A conceptual artist, versatile and kaleidoscopic, he multiplies the types of works whose execution – in some cases – is delegated with precise rules to other subjects and other hands, following the principle of ‘necessity and chance’: so the Biro (blue , blacks, reds, greens) in which the dotted pattern depicts language; thus the embroideries of letters, small or large, and multicolored; or the Tutto, dense puzzles in which heterogeneous silhouettes are found, including shapes of objects and animals, images taken from magazines and printed paper, and much more, really ‘everything’ (Tutto in Italian).
There are also postal works played on the mathematical permutation of the stamps, the haphazard adventure of the postal journey and the secret beauty of the sheets contained in the envelopes.
Another sector of Boetti’s work, unmistakably his own, offers in the early ’70s many’ exercises’ on squared paper, based on musical or mathematical rhythms; then on paper, light compositions in which ranks of animals recalling the Etruscan and Pompeian decoration fow. Time, its fascinating and ineluctable fow, is perhaps the unifying theme of Boetti’s typological and iconographic plurality.
Alighiero Boetti has exhibited in the most emblematic exhibitions of his generation, from When attitudes become form (1969) to Contemporanea (1973), from Identité italienne (1981) to The Italian Metamorphosis 1943-1968 (1994). He is several times present at the Venice Biennale, with a personal room in the 1990 edition, a posthume tribute in 2001 and a large exhibition at the Cini Foundation in the recent edition of 2017.
Among the most signifcant exhibitions of the last few years the great Game Plan retrospective has been realized in three prestigious locations (MOMA in New York, Tate in London, Reina Sofa in Madrid).
Of the ample corpus of works, many Italian and international museums are kept, including the Center Pompidou in Paris, Stedelijk Museum, the MOCA in Los Angeles, etc.).e permanent collections of leading Italian and international museums and many private collections.

Guido Fuga (Venice 1947) in ‘68, student of Architecture, meets Hugo Pratt, and starts a collaboration, the so-called special effects: bottoms, planes, junks, trains, armoured cars, which he continued until the last stories.
Between '70 and '73 he went twice in India in the legendary Volkswagen, the second trip lasting six months, when Afghanistan was ruled by the king and was the paradise of hippies.
In 1977, in the flat opposite his (it was destiny), as a guest of his friend Gianni Michelagnoli, he met the artist Alighiero Boetti, who was also in love with Afghanistan, he had gone there in '71 and had taken the "One Hotel" in Kabul, a tiny one-room hotel. In a night of smoke and stories, the idea of collaboration was born and they produced the work "Aerei", then in the 1980s the series of watercolours on the same theme "Cieli ad alta quota". He collaborated for a short period with the satirical weekly "IL Male", the best of youth. He curated Pratt's anthological exhibition at the Grand Palais and organised the set-up; after Paris, in Milan, Venice, Rome, Naples and Buenos Aires for "Italiana 86". He collaborated with Mario Schifano on a collection of carpets made in India, a country he continued to visit and where, in addition to carpets, he got marble inlay tables made by craftsmen in Udaipur.
After Hugo Pratt's death in 1997, with "Lele" Vianello, he produced "Corto Sconto", Corto Maltese's guide to Venice for the "Lizard" editions and in French for "Castermann", followed by "Navigar in laguna fra isole fiabe e ricordi" with "Mare di Carta" and "Marco Polo, testimonianze di un viaggio straordinario" with "Linea d'Acqua". In 1999, for a few months, he collaborates with the covers of the programme "Sgarbi quotidiani".
In 2003 for RAISAT Gamberorosso with his colleague Lele Vianello they edit ten episodes about the routes of their book "Navigar in Laguna", then they produce the comic book "Le Ali del leone" in collaboration with the Air Force magazine, again with Lele in 2010 he realized the story "Cubana", a comic inspired by the master Pratt.
In 2018 he made the "Merchant of Venice" diary with watercolours about the traveller in search of the most precious essences. The “Profumo illustrato” exhibition was presented at Palazzo Mocenigo in Venice.
In 2021 he participated with a project to Cleto Munari's "Essenza di marmo" collection of artist's tables.
In 2023, he created 30 tables on the fantastic journey of Nicolò Manucci, which will be presented at Palazzo Vendramin Grimani in the exhibition dedicated to the Venetian traveller from the 29th of April.


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ARTIST

Alighiero e Boetti

Aldo Mondino
Souk mondano


18.03 - 27.05.2023


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ALDO MONDINO

SOUK MONDANO

Opening 18/03/2023 h 12:00 > 19:00
18/03 > 27/05/2023*

NP-ArtLab
Vicolo dell’Osservatorio 1/C
35122 - Padova (PD)


*exhibition space
Thursday - Saturday, 12.00 - 19.00

More info: info@npartlab.com


NP-ArtLab in collaboration with Galleria Umberto Benappi (Turin) and Archivio Aldo Mondino, is pleased to present "Souk mondano" dedicated to the work of Aldo Mondino, with a focus on works influenced by his travels to the Middle East. An eclectic artist whose artistic practice has crossed different styles and influences, including 20th century European art, surrealism and pop art, without ever belonging to any group or movement.
Mondino has always refused to be framed in art-historical categories, preferring an approach full of experimentations in terms of materials, techniques and subjects. An endless research, a stubborn need to experiment, giving rise to an heterogeneous work in perpetual dialogue with the history of art.

The works on display refer to the impact that the artist's travels, in a metaphorical as well as a physical sense, have had on the development of his work. Mondino accompanied this flânerie with his curiosity and irony, translating into Mondinoan terms what he had seen during his wanderings. From the 1980s onwards, his travels intensified, confronting him with what he calls "an Orient that begins in Morocco and continues in Palestine, where I glimpse a fascinating parallelism between the prayer and the intensity of attention in conceptual painting."

His famous works of the "Dervishes", dancing subjects painted on linoleum, come from this analogy between spirituality and pictorial gesture. The Dervishes practice the ritual dance characteristic of Turkish tradition by performing fluid, circular movements. Indeed, the Dervishes series was exhibited in 1993 at the Venice Biennale curated by Achille Bonito Oliva: on that occasion Mondino presented a performance involving a group of rotating dancers from Turkey. The corpus of works the dervishes, also called le turcate, in homage to Giulio Turcato, highlight the harmonious blend of Western-style figurative painting and the decorative geometric syntax of Middle Eastern and Asian derivation.

To prove the influences from his encounters while traveling, Mondino depicts local merchants and souks, the true essence of the city, a market revealing the soul of a country: he captures the physiognomies of the subjects and the colours of the fruit together with geometric patterns. The choice of linoleum as a support in painting is quite unusual but confirms Mondino's relentless aptitude for experimentation. The use of this support synthesizes various aspects of Mondino's poetics, from the use of a highly worked surface reminiscent of Orientalism to the constant irony (the play on words that sees linen and oil as materials more commonly associated with the Western painting tradition).

A reappraisal of the material also applies to “Iznik”, the enamel-on-glass technique that is reminiscent of the terracotta artefacts of the Turkish city of Nicea: in this series of works, painting becomes ceramic, misleading the eye in this metamorphosis of painting that becomes something else.
The same trompe l'oeil of the “Tappeti stesi” hung on the walls like cloths hang to dry, transforming the exhibition space into a characteristic souk. This series of works were executed in bright colours on an industrial building material, eraclite. The texture of the media, although rough, reminds of a noble oriental carpet thanks to Mondino's elaboration of the painting-objects. The resulting illusion verges on perfection and with these works, the artist offers us a narrative composed of vivid colours and decorative motifs of a fascinating unknown universe.
Mondino's approach to the elsewhere cannot be traced solely to a fascination with exoticism but implies a veiled allusion to experiencing cultural otherness in opposition to mass tourism and Western global acceleration.

The exhibition ‘Souk mondano' will be accompanied by the publication of a catalogue.

A selection of the works part of the exhibition will also be presented by Galleria Umberto Benappi on the occasion of the 27th edition of Miart 2023 (Milan, 14-16 April) within the established section.


Aldo Mondino was born in 1938 in Turin, where he died in 2005.
In 1959 he moved to Paris where he attended the studio of William Heyter, the ‘Ecole du Louvre’, and the mosaic course at the Academy of Fine Arts with Severini and Licata.
In 1960 he returned to Italy, where he began to exhibit his work at the Galleria L'Immagine in Turin (1961) and the Galleria Alfa in Venice (1962). His meeting with Gian Enzo Sperone, director of the Galleria Il Punto, represented a turning-point in his artistic career and marked the beginning of a long collaboration that still continues today. He held a series of important solo exhibitions at the Galleria Stein in Turin, the Studio Marconi in Milan, the Galleria La Salita in Rome and the Galleria Paludetto in Turin.
Mondino’s major exhibitions include two participations in the Venice Biennale in 1976 and 1993 and solo exhibitions at the Museum für Moderne Kunst - Palais Liechtenstein in Vienna (1991), the Sultanahmet Topkapi Museum in Istanbul (1992, 1996), the Jewish Museum of Bologna (1995) and the Galleria Civica d'Arte Moderna in Trento (2000).
His works are part of the permanent collections of leading Italian and international museums and many private collections. 




Interferenze

22.10 — 26.11.2022



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Cinzia Campolese, Pietro Catarinella & Federico Polloni

INTERFERENZE
22/10 > 26/11/2022*

Opening 22/10 h 16:00 > 20:00


NP-ArtLab
Vicolo dell’Osservatorio 1/C
35122 - Padova (PD)


*Private exhibition space
Wednesday - Saturday, 12.00 - 19.00

For more info: info@npartlab.com


NP-ArtLab is pleased to present the group show “Interferenze”, the title refers to the digital atmosphere melt with reality created by the works by Cinzia Campolese, Pietro Catarinella e Federico Polloni.

The works displayed are related to the concept of physics called interference: the combination of two or more electromagnetic waveforms to form a resultant wave in which the displacement is either reinforced or cancelled. The reference goes to every effect of superimposition of two phenomena of the same nature which implies the possibility of mutual disturbance.

Interference as relation in the work of Cinzia Campolese, as an overlap in Pietro Catarinella’s paintings up to Federico Polloni’s altered vision towards metaphysical worlds.
The exhibition is linked to digital but the human presence persists and mixes through distorted visions. Cinzia Campolese (Italy, 1987) presents the work “Could you take a picture?” which invites visitors to use their cameras to view visual compositions hidden from the naked eye.
Through the camera of our smartphones it is possible to see the interference patterns that create the final visual outcome. The piece’s title reveals the action to be taken to underline the constant need to record our everyday life with a camera.
A series of paintings  by Pietro Catarinella (Rome, 1983) is presented: oil painting mixed with digital through a superimposition of techniques and medias. The result is a distorted image that allows us to perceive the references to painting and its traditional subjects but also the virtual aspects that give us a completely new reading. To complete the exhibition’s path, Federico Polloni (Treviso, 1991) ’s installation give us access to his metaphysical world made up of volumes, neon and objects creating a suspended landscape. Some works on canvas complete the atmosphere that aims to tell the present time with a look to the future according to a concept of technological dystopia.


BIO

Cinzia Campolese (Lanciano (CH), 1987) is an Italian artist who lives and works in Montreal (CA). Her work includes installations, sculptures, videos and prints. Working on different scales, she question the concepts of perception and awareness of spaces,  both in digital and real in environments. After her studies in art and design in Florence, she moved to Paris, where she funded the collective “IF'" in 2012, working on architecture projects and digital art installations. Three years after she started developing her own productions and in 2016 she moved to Montreal where she developed her artistic career. Her works have been shown in institutions, galleries and cultural events, such us Goethe Institut (Montreal), B39 (Seoul), Wood Street Gallery (Pittsburgh), Chroniques Biennale (Marseille), Adiacenze (Bologna), Stereolux (Nantes), Centre Wallonie-Bruxelles (Paris), Livart gallery, Eastern Bloc, Phi Center and Mutek (Montreal).
Her projects have been published on L'Œil, Vice, Aesthetica Magazine, Gallerytalk, Juliet Art Magazine, Archdaily, Fubiz and she has been included in the book by Exibart "222 artisti emergenti su cui investire”, 2019.

Pietro Catarinella (Roma, 1983) works and lives in Milan. After his studied in architecture, he completed a master in Photography at Central Saint Martins, London, in 2014. Here is when he defines his artistic practice: a research on digital genesis that questions the reality’s changes and the visual representation of the internet era, of social networks and new media. Between 2015 and 2018, his work has been exhibited in London (East London Photography Festival, Green Arcola Gallery and Ashurst Ermerging Artist Gallery), in China (Pingyao International Photography Festival), in Lithuania (AV17 Gallery), in Rome (Mattatoio / Macro Future and Temple Gallery), and in Madrid (Nadie, Nunca, Nada, No). In 2018, he was finalist at Ashurst Emerging Artist Prize. During his residency at Vir Viafarini-in-residence, his practice evolves into an investigation of the relationship between digital and physical space, and he is invited by Bruno Barsanti to The Others Art Fair (Turin). In 2019 he makes several site-specific installations including 'Cave of Forgotten Dreams' (Macro, Museum of Contemporary Art, Rome) and 'Google's Decalogue' (Spazio Gamma, Milan). He won the Ora Prize in 2019, he was selected for the 'Lumen Prize' in London (2017 and 2019), and the Francesco Fabbri Prize (2019).
In May 2020, he was part of Studio Visit - 30 Artists for 30 Days, a virtual exhibition conceived by the Pini Foundation, later published in a volume by Studio Boite Edition. In October of the same year, he founded Armenia Studio, a hybrid space project including 7 shared studios and a Project Room. From March to June 2021, he took part in two bi-personal exhibitions, the first in Ida Pisani's PROMETEOGALLERY, accompanied by a critical text written by Mauro Zanchi, the second in the Concordia II space (Milan), a collaboration between PROMETEOGALLERY and Vir Viafarini-in-residence.

Federico Polloni (Treviso, 1991) lives and works in Venice.
He graduated in painting at the Academy of Fine Arts in Venice in 2021 with prof. Aldo Grazzi and Carlo Di Raco. He participated to several international exhibitions, including the most recent: Wopart fair Switzerland; Venice Time Case project curated by Luca Massimo Barbero, Unlikely at Palazzo Mocenigo Venice. In 2020 he founded the cultural association Acromo based in Venice, dedicated to the promotion of contemporary art in the Venetian territory. In the same year he opened a shared Lab Space Casablanca_studio_ based in Venice. In 2021 he collaborated on the creation of the first independent open studio festival involving young emerging artists working in Venice (Venice Independent Art Scene).



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ARTISTS

Cinzia Campolese,Pietro Catarinella & Federico Polloni

Lettura classica

17.11 — 22.12.2022


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LETTURA CLASSICA

with works by Giorgio De Chirico, Alekos Fassianos, Giulio Paolini,
Salvo e Francesco Vezzoli

opening 17/11
17/11 > 22/12/2022*

NP Viewing room
Corso Monforte 23, Milano

*private exhibition space
Tuesday - Thursday, 12.00 - 19.00
only on appointment

More info: info@npartlab.com

NP ArtLab presents a selection of artworks refering to the classical era, every artists according to his personal interpretation. 
Capitals, columns, fragments of classical statues alternate with the representation of books and fighters. The aim is to show how each artist has developed a common theme according to their own research.

In the center of the room the three plaster sculptures by Giulio Paolini (Genoa, 1940) entitled "Proteus", "Proteus (II)" and "Proteus (III)", created in 1971, their titles come from the changeable Greek god who had the ability to transform into any form he desired. Perfect representation of Paolini's ludic conceptual practice, the three sculptures are the result of the disintegration and subsequent reassembly of a classic bust of Homer, as Paolini himself stated "not to restore its physiognomy but rather the portion of space it originally occupied" . A pictorial reading of classicism takes place in the works of Salvo (Leonforte, 1947 - Turin, 2015), in which architectural ruins and visions of classical columns emerge, studied at various times of the day and night with bright colors that mark the return to the painting of the artist after a period associated with poor art. In addition to his monumental paintings, the representation of volumes in "8 books" from 1986 also emerges.

The memory and dialogue with the past continue with the work by Francesco Vezzoli (Brescia, 1971) "Iolas the Great" (2020), a fragment of Greek terracotta depicting Alexander the Great as Dionysus from the Hellenistic age (about the 3rd century BC) and in which he intervenes with acrylic paint. This work underlines Vezzoli's constant attention to the importance of preserving the artistic and archaeological heritage.In addition to the classical architectural and sculptural references, representations of gladiators and warriors are inserted with the works "Combattimento" (1936-37) by the father of metaphysical painting, Giorgio De Chirico (Volos, 1888 - Rome, 1978) and with "Untitled" (1989), work on paper by the Greek painter Alekos Fassianos (Athens, 1935 - 2022).


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Artists:

Giorgio De Chirico, Alekos Fassianos, Giulio Paolini, Salvo e Francesco Vezzoli

Opening NP Viewing Room in Milan

21.09 — 26.10.2022


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In the occasion of NP-Viewing Room’s opening in Milan

NP-ArtLab is pleased to announce a selection of works by some artists of Venice Time Case’s project

Opening 21/09 h 18:00 > 21:00
21/09 > 26/10/2022*

NP-Viewing Room
Corso Monforte 23, Milano

*Private exhibition space
More info: info@npartlab.com

NP ArtLab is pleased to announce the opening of a new space in corso Monforte 23, in Milan. In order to create a connection with the space in Padua, some artworks by some of the artists displayed at “Venice Time Case” exhibition will be exhibited in Milan.

NP ArtLab is a project dedicated to the research and promotion of Contemporary art practices and aims to support and enhance emerging, mid-career and established artists. The program includes exhibitions conceived on the dialogue between different media of established and young artists belonging to the emerging contemporary art scene including events, in-person and online.

The initiative is conceived by Neri Pagnan (NP), enthusiastic collector and secondary art market’s dealer, who started collecting established artists of the twentieth century, and later Italian and international emerging artists. This action highlights how the two art markets , the established and the emerging one, are different but equally interconnected and how the works by young artists often look to the past, to masters of the Twentieth century ore refer to previous periods. In this sense, Np Art Lab tries to create and interpret the aesthetic and conceptual dialogue between artists of different generations using critic and curatorial supports.




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Artists:

Beatrice Alici, Giulia Maria Belli, Federico Borroni, Giorgia Agnese Cereda, Fabio De Meo, Andrea Grotto, Manuela Kokanovic, Luca Marignoni, Margherita Mezzetti, Cristina Porro, Carolina Pozzi, Filippo Rizzonelli, Mattia Sinigaglia, Maddalena Tesser, Sophie Westerlind, Francesco Zanatta.

Spazi espositivi privati
NP ArtLab
Vicolo dell’Osservatorio 1/C
35122 - Padova (PD)
NP Viewing Room
C.so Monforte 23
20122 - Milano (MI)

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P.zza Capitaniato 16
35139 - Padova | Padua (PD)
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