Magazzino Italian Art announces the fifth iteration of the annual spring lecture series which brings together some of the leading scholars of Arte Povera to present new perspectives on postwar Italian art. The 2023 Lecture Series, Arte Povera: Artistic Tradition and Transatlantic Dialogue, curated by Dr. Roberta Minnucci, Magazzino’s 2022-23 Scholar-in-Residence, will address research topics which are strictly interconnected with Arte Povera’s relationship with the past and its artistic exchanges with the United States. Participants for the 2023 season will feature Dr. Marin R. Sullivan, Dr. Roberta Minnucci, Dr. Laura Petican, and Dr. Raffaele Bedarida.
The four-part lecture series will explore how Arte Povera’s artistic identity was concurrently shaped, on the one hand, by the legacy of artistic tradition and, on the other, by its dialogue with American art. Presented by Germano Celant in 1967 to describe the experimental practices of a group of young Italian artists, Arte Povera adopted a process-oriented approach based on the investigation of unconventional materials and the active involvement of the viewer, situating itself in dialogue with artistic experiments emerging in Europe and the United States. As opposed to their international peers, however, a number of Arte Povera artists engaged profoundly with the past, employing references to Italian and European cultural heritage in order to reclaim a specific artistic identity in the face of the increasing global relevance of American contemporary art.
The award of the 1964 Venice Biennale’s Grand Prize to Robert Rauschenberg marked the international recognition of American Pop Art, which was condemned by Italian artists for being an uncritical celebration of consumer society promoted by a lucrative art market. Beyond this ideological opposition, however, some Arte Povera artists demonstrated a strong interest towards and profound knowledge of contemporary American artistic trends. The United States offered Italian artists an important international platform for presenting their works to a new audience, just as Italy provided American artists wider international exposure to their work in Europe. This generated an unprecedented artistic exchange between the two sides of the Atlantic, leading Italian and American artists to engage in a sustained dialogue that is still awaiting to be fully examined in the academic domain.
By considering the Italian artists’ relationship with their own cultural heritage as well as with the international artistic scene, Dr. Petican, Dr. Sullivan, Dr. Bedarida, and Dr. Minnucci will share their insight into the intricate dynamics embedded in the progressive definition of Arte Povera’s artistic identity. Each lecture will offer a more complex reading of Arte Povera’s relationship with cultural identity and the United States, shedding light on crucial themes within the current scholarly debate that include dynamics of influence, transatlantic exchange, cultural diplomacy, and artistic heritage.
The full program and dates here:
Magazzino Italian Art | 2700 Route 9, Cold Spring, NY
March 18, April 1, April 15, & April 30, 2023 | 12PM
