JEAN TINGUELY
Exhibition Upcoming – NAVATE Pirelli HangarBicocca 10 October 2024–2 February 2025 MilanJean Tinguely (Fribourg, 1925 – Berne 1991) is considered one of the greatest pioneers of 20th-century art who radically changed the concept of the artwork itself, and one of the foremost exponents of kinetic art. His work focuses on the exploration of the machine, its function and movement, its noises and sounds, and its inherent poetry. Tinguely was one of the first artists to incorporate found objects, gears, and other materials into his work, welding them together to create noisy, cacophonous machines powered by real engines. His sculptures also have a performative quality due to their constant movement and peculiar ability to involve the audience. Gears, especially wheels, are often the basic elements of his works, in which the artist deliberately disrupts their traditional functions. Tinguely liberates the machine from the tyranny of utility by promoting the unexpected and ephemeral in his absurd, seemingly comical contraptions.
The exhibition at Pirelli HangarBicocca is the most extensive survey in Italy since the artistʼs death, and will include more than thirty seminal works from the 1950s to the 1980s, occupying nearly the entire 5000 sqm space. The last major tribute to Jean Tinguely in an Italian institution took place in 1987 with the exhibition “Una magia più forte della morte” (A magic Stronger than Death) at Palazzo Grassi in Venice, curated by Pontus Hultén. The new Milan exhibition project is closely tied to the original industrial purpose of the Pirelli HangarBicocca building. The show will be the occasion to reflect on the artist’s idea of museum and the “anti-museum,” and at the same time it will recall his workshop-factory in La Verrerie in canton Fribourg: the result will be a sonic and visual scenery of monumental kinetic works, where colorful musical installations will be juxtaposed with, cacophonous machines. This retrospective exhibition will also be an opportunity to recall Jean Tinguelyʼs close relationship with Milan, which was the focus of some of his most ambitious projects, such as La Vittoria (1970), an iconic performance that took place in Piazza Duomo. The exhibition is realized in collaboration with Museum Tinguely, Basel.
Installation Views
Also Exhibiting at Pirelli HangarBicocca
Pirelli HangarBicocca is a non-profit foundation, established in 2004, which has converted a former industrial plant in Milan into an institution for producing and promoting contemporary art. This dynamic center for experimentation and discovery covers 15,000 square meters, making it one of the largest contiguous exhibition spaces in Europe. It presents major solo shows every year by Italian and international artists, with each project conceived to work in close relation to the architecture of the complex, and explored in depth through a calendar of parallel events. Admission to the space and the shows is completely free of charge, and facilitators are on hand to help the public connect with the art. Since 2012, Vicente Todolí has been the foundation’s Artistic Director.
Milano
Milan
Italy
Closed Monday – Wednesday
http://www.pirellihangarbicocca.org/en/
Closed Monday – Wednesday
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