Giorgio Morandi is the central figure of an international cultural scene involving numerous events and long-term projects.
The fulcrum of these initiatives is twofold: the anthological exhibition Giorgio Morandi 1890-1964, curated by Maria Cristina Bandera and Renato Miracco (from 22 January to 13 April 2009 at the MAMbo – Museum of Modern Art in Bologna) and the forthcoming restoration of the house in Bologna where the artist lived until 1964, which will become a place devoted to research.

The exhibition, one of the most complete ever devoted to this Bolognese master, presents over a hundred of his works, an exhaustive collection tracing the evolution of the artist from his beginnings to his metaphysical researches, and to the fade-out of painting during his last years.

In addition to works belonging to the Morandi Museum in Bologna the curators also selected works from the collections of scholars critics and friends of the artist, such as Roberto Longhi, Cesare Brandi, Lamberto Vitali, James Thrall Soby, Carlo Ludovico Ragghianti, Lionello Venturi and John Rewald. Also included are paintings bought from Morandi by collectors who were able to recognize his genius from the start, such as Boschi Di Stefano, Ghiringhelli, Giovanardi, Ingrao, Jesi, Jucker, Magnani, Mattioli, Plaza and Rollino. Also on display are major masterpieces from other American museums, such as the MoMA of New York, the National Gallery of Art, the Phillips Collection and Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden in Washington or the Yale University Art Gallery in New Haven, so that visitors to the Italian end of the initiative will have a unique opportunity to see these paintings. Other loans come from important Italian institutions and museums such as the Chamber of Deputies, the Pinacoteca di Brera (Milano), the MART (Rovereto), the Galleria degli Uffizi (Florence), the Fondazione Roberto Longhi (Florence), the Peggy Guggenheim Collection (Venice), the Galleria Nazionale d’Arte Moderna (Rome), the Galleria Civica d’Arte Moderna e Contemporanea (Turin), the Fondazione Magnani-Rocca (Mamiano di Traversetolo, Parma).

Morandi was born in Bologna in 1890 where he lived and died in 1964. His visibility began as an artist in the culminating years of the Avant-gardes. He seldom traveled and went abroad only three times to Switzerland in later life. Despite this, as an artist he was learned and well aware of the trends of European Modern art since he received books and other publications from the best-informed critics. However, he seldom and reluctantly talked of foreign trends and especially of theoretical questions. He had closer at heart his work as a painter and as a teacher of the etching technique at the Accademia di Belle Arti of Bologna. Nonetheless, a private dialogue with the international Avant-gardes is evident, mostly in his earlier works. He painted straightforward Cubist compositions, approached the Futurist Movement and was probably the subtlest main-character of the Metaphysics years. This period came to a close and with it the subversive tastes of the Avant-gardes began to fade. This is when Morandi began his own personal research using different techniques such as painting in oil, etching, watercolour and drawing and developed an artistic vocabulary of refined simplification. The essential lucidity of his compositions conspired with the abstract transfiguration of his perception towards the vanishing of the outline. This led him to declare: “Once again, the world is made up of nothing or very little. What is important is the different or new position from which the artist sees the objects of so-called nature and the works of art that preceded him and interest him”.
Morandi’s adventure as man and artist will be testified for by the restoration and re-opening of his home in Via Fondazza 36, in Bologna, carried out thanks to the help of the Municipality of Bologna and Unindustria Bologna.
Thanks to the reconstruction of the environment under the guidance of the architect Massimo Iosa Ghini, when work is completed it will be possible to revive and breathe the atmosphere of Morandi himself, from the studio recreated in great detail to the numerous objects now viewable again after years in the care of the trustee of the donation Carlo Zucchini, and even to the experiments in colours left by the artist on the walls. Morandi’s life and work will be reconstructed for the visitor also with the aid of multimedia technology. Ample space will by allotted to research, with access to Morandi’s library and to numerous documents belonging to the artist. There will be a reading room for study and a multi-purpose room for meetings, seminaries and exhibitions.

The Istituzione Galleria d’Arte Moderna, from which depend the MAMbo, the Museo Morandi, Villa delle Rose, and more recently the Museo per la Memoria di Ustica, sees the restoration of Casa Morandi as an exemplary opportunity for constructive collaboration between public and private, lending new impetus to studies of the artist, enhancing the already extraordinary collection on view at the Museo Morandi with further occasions for research. The museum was inaugurated in 1993, following a generous donation to the Municipality of Bologna from the artist’s sister, Maria Teresa Morandi. United with an important group of paintings already in the possession of the Galleria d’Arte Moderna, these works gave rise to the largest and most important public collection devoted to this Bolognese master, with over 250 oil paintings, watercolours, drawings, etchings, sculptures and engraved plates, of which 28 are at present on view at the MET. The Museo Morandi has recently undergone a radical reorganization following certain loans and the dismantling of the studio, which is due to find a place in Via Fondazza. The new layout will provide a fresh look at Morandi’s work, with a display in which all the various techniques he employed both alternate and live together. The two spacious central rooms are so arranged as to allow for temporary exhibitions of other artists, which will compare and “converse” with the art of Morandi.

Our hope is that the greater prestige conferred upon the historical legacy of Giorgio Morandi, the restoration of his home, the important international exhibitions and the renovation of the museum will act as a springboard for further studies and the critical appreciation of the artist in years to come.

With our thanks for providing the information:
Ufficio Communicazione MAMbo
tel.: 39 051 6496653 | 39 051 6496654
Email: ufficiostampaMAMbo@comune.bologna.it