I'm a dual national, so, in more prosperous times, I'm often lucky enough to spend some time in my hometown (Melbourne) as well as Rometown (Rome).
Obviously, COVID19 has thrown all that out the window. I've spent almost a year now working mostly from home - feeling a bit Hitchcocky constantly looking out my rear window - as I work away on my day job and my writing. With Australia's closed border policy, and restricted movement in Italy due to the ongoing high number of COVID19 cases here, there are times when I feel neither here nor there, a sentiment that I think we've all been feeling this last year. That said, with the lifting of some restrictions here in Rome, I managed to escape out to the Palazzo delle Esposizioni to check out the 2020 Quadriennale. I did have a date back in October to see the Quadriennale with two of my most dedicated gallery loving friends, but we were sent into lockdown the day before we were due to see the show. It's billed as Fuori (=out in Italian) and, as pan-contemporary exhibitions often do, it left me delighted and perplexed (and sometimes just plain unimpressed). But that said, I was so hungry to get out of my living room and experience some culture first hand, that even when I found the artwork underwhelming, I was just happy to be seeing things through someone else's perspective for a change. As a huge exhibition designed to push the boundaries over two enormous levels, there were obviously still some gems in the line up. Among the highlights for me were Irma Blank's gorgeous indigo blue panels. They sent me back to Japan and the old ukiyo-e prints that I studied at uni. Also enjoyed the playful nature of the work by the Tomboys Don't Cry collective and the adjoining room in which Diego Gualandris did things with painting and textiles that I've never seen someone do before and Raffaela Naldi Rossano had my fatigued little brain working overtime until it eventually decrypted her powerful textual messages. Getting out and about to take in some culture or feed off of other people's ideas is not an easy prospect at this point in time. And maybe you're neither here (Rome) nor there (Melbourne). But wherever you are, you can take a free virtual tour of the Fuori show if you're interested. It's a lovely 360 of the huge exhibit that allows you to take in the cavernous spaces and representations of all the artwork in the show. Want to get out? Do it here.
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As part of my continuing work with Kunstpedia, a non profit organisation whose mission is to encourage greater public engagement with the arts, I will be visiting a number of exhibitions across Rome over the coming weeks. Kunstpedia has a number of correspondents across major European cities and in New York and spotlights the historical arts (basically pre-1960s). I have been covering exhibitions in Rome in recent months and I have generally sought out exhibitions which are a little off from the Italian mainstream, including visiting exhibits from Russia and a recent exhibition focusing on Orientalism. Upcoming exhibits will be a little more standard fare by Italian standards, but Rome's exhibition scene is constantly evolving, so hopefully there will be some interesting intercultural exhibitions on the horizon in 2012. I'll be posting soon, but in the meantime you can visit kunstpedia by way of my column page here. |
Dave
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Dave Di Vito is a writer, teacher and former curator.He's also the author of the Vinyl Tiger series and Replace The Sky.
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