Pistoia Novecento

The radical design of Archizoom, the binary logic of Gianfranco Chiavacci’s works, the collages of Remo Gordigiani, the abstractionist explorations of Gualtiero Nativi, Mario Nigro and Fernando Melani, the Pop-Art paintings and objects of Roberto Barni, Umberto Buscioni, Adolfo Natalini and Gianni Ruffi: more than 70 works mark the second chapter of the PISTOIA NOVECENTO project with the exhibition entitled An Overview of the Art of the Post World War II period, a long-term temporary exhibition curated by Alessandra Acocella, Annamaria Iacuzzi and Caterina Toschi presented by Pistoia Musei in its Palazzo de’ Rossi premises.

PISTOIA NOVECENTO is the large-scale project dedicated to Pistoia Musei’s permanent collection, with works from the Fondazione Caript Foundation and Intesa Sanpaolo (formerly the Cassa di Risparmio di Pistoia e Pescia) collections, designed to provide the most thorough understanding possible of the Pistoian artistic scene in all its variations throughout the last century. The first part of the project, which finished at the end of August 2020, focused on the first half of the twentieth century.

This second part – PISTOIA NOVECENTO. An Overview of the Art of the Post World War II Period – provides an overview of the second half of the century in Pistoia.

In addition to the works by Pistoian artists in Pistoia Musei’s permanent collection, the exhibition also brings together works by artists who were not from Pistoia but who established an exchange and a dialogue with the city, as well as works loaned from public and private collections.

The curators deliberately chose to enrich the exhibition with a wide range of documentation (photographs, letters, posters, invitations, videos): this unprecedented decision is aimed at offering a better description of the liveliness of the Pistoian artistic climate in the broader context of Tuscan, national and international culture. The intention is to offer new insights into the main artistic experiences in Pistoia, and thus providing a contextual framework for the selected artworks.

The works in PISTOIA NOVECENTO. An Overview of the Art of the Post World War II Period follow chronological order, starting immediately after the Second World War, and is divided into broad thematic areas: REALISM AND FIGURATIVE ART; ABSTRACT, MATTER-BASED AND PROGRAMMED ART; OBJECT AND IMAGE; NATURE AND ARTIFICE; MARK, GESTURE AND ENVIRONMENT.

The documentary materials such as photographs, correspondence, posters and audiovisual resources are arranged according to a graphic and presentational plan designed specifically for the occasion that makes it possible to offer multiple levels of interpretation.

Palazzo de’ Rossi establishes itself as one of the strengths of Pistoia Musei museum complex, revealing itself once again as a centre dedicated to twentieth-century art in Pistoia, a point of reference for acquiring knowledge about the various artistic generations that succeeded each other throughout the last century: artists who, with courage and authentic exploration, have always sought to establish a dialogue with the great centres of art while making their own, original contributions.

Among the artists included in the exhibition are: Archizoom, Roberto Barni, Sigfrido Bartolini, Vinicio Berti, Massimo Biagi, Franco Bovani, Umberto Buscioni, Sergio Cammilli, Alfiero Capellini, Gianfranco Chiavacci, Andrea Dami, Agenore Fabbri, Alfredo Fabbri, Aldo Frosini, Giuseppe Gavazzi, Valerio Gelli, Donatella Giuntoli, Remo Gordigiani, Renato Guttuso, Mirando Iacomelli, Lando Landini, Marcello Lucarelli, Fernando Melani, Francesco Melani, Eugenio Miccini, Adolfo Natalini, Gualtiero Nativi, Mario Nigro, Renato Ranaldi, Gianni Ruffi, Giorgio Ulivi, Jorio Vivarelli and Corrado Zanzotto.