La meraviglia
Exhibition
Art Residencies 2019-2020
From 1 to 26 July
SPECIAL OPENING THURSDAY 23 JULY
from 6pm to 1am (last entrance at 00:30 am). Free guided tours are available on reservation at info@manifatturatabacchi.com
OPENING TIMES
Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday: 6pm-11pm
Monday-Wednesday: by reservation info@manifatturatabacchi.com
FREE ENTRY
La meraviglia is the second edition in the three-year Art Residencies Programme at Manifattura Tabacchi. The exhibition features works from Davide D’Amelio, Anna Dormio, Bekhbaatar Enkhtur, Esma Ilter, Giulia Poppi and Negar Sh, alongside works that the artists created collectively during each of the workshops with Stefania Galegati, Rä Di Martino, Pantani-Surace, Goldschmied&Chiari, Elena Mazzi and Robert Pettena.
The residency has been a platform not only for individual artistic research and creation, but also as a means of exchanging ideas and designing collective works, thanks to a packed programme of workshops and seminars with nationally and internationally renowned artists and curators.
la meraviglia
In accordance with safety measures taken by the Italian Government to contain the COVID-19 emergency, access to the exhibition will be limited to a fixed number of people.
La meraviglia (Wonder) is the second edition in the three-year Art Residencies Programme at Manifattura Tabacchi, LA CURA (Care), LA MERAVIGLIA (Wonder), L’ARMONIA (Harmony), curated by Sergio Risaliti, art historian, curator and director of the Museo Novecento in Florence, with Paolo Parisi, artist and teacher at the Florence Academy of Fine Arts, taking on the role of tutor for the young artists.
The theme of La meraviglia was meant in its widest sense: the wonder that is found in materials, in technologies, in images, in natural genomes, in industrial and artisan production, and in artistic and poetic creation. Selected from Italian Academies of Fine Arts, the artists Davide D’Amelio, Anna Dormio, Bekhbaatar Enkhtur, Esma Ilter, Giulia Poppi and Negar Sh have been called upon to work with the spaces and the history of Manifattura Tabacchi, deepening their own knowledge of Tuscany through carefully chosen visits to art collections and production sites, which supply artists from all over the world.
The curator
“Manifattura Tabacchi is experiencing a creative, experimental, interdisciplinary, and innovative rebirth. The very existence of this three-year cycle of artists-in-residence proves that the historical Renaissance (whose core was Firenze) is ongoing; we are witnessing a ‘renaissance in progress’ – the glorious flourishing of art that occurred during the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries continues today.
What could be more relevant to art than the idea of ‘la meraviglia’, the idea of wonder? Is not the ultimate goal of artistic creativity the creation of marvelous things? With ‘la meraviglia’ in mind, we asked the artists-in-residence to reflect upon this magical word, to draw inspiration from it and use it as a catalyst. Wonder is perhaps the first emotion which awakened man to the beauty of nature, marveling at his own thoughts and his capacity to create. Feeling and object became intertwined, an extraordinary, irreversible fact. Vision and sentiment, intelligence and imagination. We can imagine the sense of awe inspired before the starry sky. Wonder sweetened the fear of living in the world. Wonder dilated man’s perception, widening his visible horizon.
‘Meraviglia’ is the word that acts as a frame and as a starting point for the artistic gesture, a word that is appropriate to describe the Manifattura Tabacchi’s global vision. Knowledge is used against the repetition of old models, stereotypes, in opposition to what is always the same. Six young artists from different cultures and artistic backgrounds – Davide D’Amelio, Anna Dormio, Bekhbaatar Enkhtur, Esma Ilter, Giulia Poppi e Negar Sh – gave life to an experience of new-renaissance. Because Art generates wonderful things.
This second chapter of Art Residencies has been dedicated to the sense of wonder understood from a broader frame of mind, including: the materials and technologies employed, heavenly and earthly phenomena, industrial and artisanal production. Wonder before the expansion of thought, and wonder as a primary source of creativity. Awe and wonder are understood as sparks that generate all that is beautiful, exceptional, magnificent. Wonder for both the microcosmos and the infinite universe. For small, delicate artistic inventions and the poet’s verses.”
Sergio Risaliti
