23 June 2015
One, a hundred, a thousand shows. The exhibition project at the new Fondazione Prada is a journey into the history of art: it starts out from fragments of classical statuary, noses and fingers, and culminates in recent sculpture, with the mutilated bodies of Robert Gober and Louise Bourgeois presented in the Haunted House, i.e. the iconic gilded tower of Rem Koolhaas’s extraordinary work of architecture. The beating heart of the project is the exhibition curated by Salvatore Settis and Anna Anguissola: with a platoon of crouching Venuses, discus throwers and caryatids of the Roman and later periods, the two curators explore the mechanism of serial reproduction and the fondness of the ancients for the multiple. Everything is summed up in the title, Serial Classic, which tells us with a pop touch and a probing sense of humor that the seriality so much in vogue in contemporary art has roots in the distant past. Around it, the spaces of the former distillery house an infinitesimal part of Miuccia Prada and Patrizio Bertelli’s vast collection: the south wing presents a selection of works arranged in chronological order that includes some of the couple’s most emblematic acquisitions: from the playful creations of Pino Pascali to the spatial concepts of Lucio Fontana. Then, through a small sliding door, you enter a hangar filled with artist’s vehicles: those of the English “bad girl” Sarah Lucas (protagonist of the British Pavilion at the Venice Biennale, editor’s note) have been in crashes and are covered with cigarette butts. In the north wing, on the other hand, there’s a show on the theme of the body: material, gesture, action and symbol in a progression that stretches from Robert Rauschenberg to Charles Atlas. And this is not all. In the courtyard, under the pavilion that houses the movie theater, an installation of thirty metric tons of gray cardboard presents the sculptural backstage of the photographer Thomas Demand, while in the adjacent building a conversation between three voices, Triptych, presents a number of works from the collection in rotation. The first three, united by their use of minimalist forms and natural elements, are by Pino Pascali, Damien Hirst and Eva Hesse (until January 10, 2016). And this is just the unmissable beginning.
Serial Classic
Fondazione Prada
A cura di Salvatore Settis e Anna Anguissola
Milano
9 maggio > 24 agosto 2015
L’Apollo di Kassel. Veduta della mostra Serial Classic, Fondazione Prada Milano, 2015.
Photo: Attilio Maranzano. Courtesy: Fondazione Prada.
Discobolo, veduta della mostra Serial Classic, Fondazione Prada Milano, 2015.
Photo: Attilio Maranzano. Courtesy: Fondazione Prada.
L’atleta di Amelung, veduta della mostra Serial Classic, Fondazione Prada Milano, 2015.
Photo: Attilio Maranzano. Courtesy: Fondazione Prada.
Venere accovacciata, veduta della mostra Serial Classic, Fondazione Prada Milano, 2015.
Photo: Attilio Maranzano. Courtesy: Fondazione Prada.
Walter De Maria, Bel Air Trilogy: Circle Rod, Square Rod, Triangle Rod 2000-2011. Veduta della mostra An Introduction, Fondazione Prada Milano, 2015. Photo: Attilio Maranzano. Courtesy: Fondazione Prada.
Veduta dell’istallazione permanente Processo grottesco di Thomas Demand, Fondazione Prada Milano, 2015. Photo: Attilio Maranzano. Courtesy: Fondazione Prada.
Veduta dell’istallazione permanente Processo grottesco di Thomas Demand, Fondazione Prada Milano, 2015. Photo: Attilio Maranzano. Courtesy: Fondazione Prada.
Veduta dell’istallazione permanente Processo grottesco di Thomas Demand, Fondazione Prada Milano, 2015. Photo: Attilio Maranzano. Courtesy: Fondazione Prada.
Damien Hirst, Lost Love, 2000. Veduta progetto Trittico, Fondazione Prada Milano, 2015. Photo: Attilio Maranzano. Courtesy: Fondazione Prada.
Damien Hirst, Lost Love, 2000. Veduta progetto Trittico, Fondazione Prada Milano, 2015. Photo: Attilio Maranzano. Courtesy: Fondazione Prada.