"Autobiography of the Mother": Silvia Codignola's exhibition, reviewed by Shara Wasserman

Shara Wasserman, right, with Dianne Bennett, 2013

For this review of an ongoing exhibition at the Museo Carlo Bilotti, RST is pleased to welcome as guest blogger Shara Wasserman. Wasserman is an American art historian and curator of contemporary art.  She received her BA in Art History with honors from Temple University and her MA in Art History from the Institute of Fine Arts of New York University. Following a period at the Guggenheim Museum in New York, first as Hilla von Rebay fellow and later as Editorial Assistant, Wasserman relocated to Rome.  She is on the faculty of Temple University Rome, where she serves as Director of Exhibitions.  

The Museo Carlo Bilotti, an exhibition space in the heart of the Villa Borghese in Rome, is hosting a lovely display of a decade of work by Roman artist Silvia Codignola.  Curated by Lea Mattarella,  the show runs through October 22.

Silvia Codignola, in her Rome studio, 2013

Trained as an architect, Codignola moved to the visual arts early in her career, producing a varied body of work that includes drawing, sculpture, paintings and installations.  Her early architectural training is always present and results in a focus on structure and geometry.  Solid, expressionless figures inhabit empty spaces; dark colors and sharp chiaroscuro keep the spectator’s eye on the surface plane; still life objects and figures firmly positioned in their environment hold our attention, almost as if they comprise a stage set.

Mario Sironi, "Landscape with Figures," 1932

Her artistic preferences move from the Italian Early Renaissance, with artists such as Piero della Francesca and Masaccio, to Mario Sironi, the prominent Italian painter of the 1920s and 1930s, whose spare landscapes presage Codignola’s compositions.

Titled Autobiography of the Mother, the works on exhibition were culled from a decade of the artist’s production – 2006-2016 – and in particular from her almost obsessive focus on mothers and children. Two of her paintings are reproduced below.

By including many versions of the same subject, Codignola guides the spectator viewing this exhibition through a variety of aspects and stages of motherhood: from the powerful armless, headless, anonymous pregnant woman, to the lonely sleeping mother rigidly supporting the head of her child, to the absently nursing mother, to the mother reclining with her child, to the distracted mother inserted in an austere beachscape, to the final images of a small arm reaching out of the darkness towards an old man. 

Both a mother – the show is dedicated to her daughter Miranda -- and a daughter, Silvia Codignola infuses the works with a reflection, a kind of chronology, of mother and child. 

As we walk through the show, we think of Silvia the woman, but we also think of Silvia the artist as the link between life and the strong symbolism, especially in Italian art, that woman represents.  She is the life giver, the universal mater, the bearer of the seed and the symbol of fertility; she is wisdom and intellect and war and protection.  In short, she is Mother.

A long-time fan of Silvia’s art, I am always excited to see new work and the new way that she thinks of her previous work.  This exhibition fulfills both.

Shara Wasserman

Director of Exhibitions

Gallery of Art, Temple University Rome

More than the Trevi Fountain: Prosciutto, Palazzi, Prints and Paintings within a coin's throw.

The Trevi Fountain is definitely a Rome the First Time experience--and many more times after that, we think. So don't miss it.  (And some advice on visiting it below... it's not so simple these days.)

But there's more!
Three historic Renaissance palazzi, more than three free exhibition spaces, and great food abound in the small streets to the right and left of the fountain.

To fuel yourselves for fighting the crowds and police that now surround the fountain, try the mouth-watering, tiny prosciutteria off the piazza. I must admit I wasn't keen on meeting our family there, expecting something trending on Yelp or Facebook, with little local flavor.  I was so wrong, as the "before" and "after" photos illustrate. La Prosciutteria Trevi, via della Panetteria, No. 34,11 a.m. - 11:30 p.m.

Sonia Delaunay print

Now for some art.  The Trevi Fountain overwhelms everything near it; thus, it's understandable that three or more (depending on how one counts them) art exhibition spaces are almost on top of the fountain and yet usually quite devoid of visitors. Istituto Centrale per la Grafica - the Central Graphics Institute - is contiguous with the building on which the fountain is built.  Go along the street on the right of the fountain and you'll find the entrance on your left.  It has excellent shows.  We've seen many there - from Piranesi's fantasy prints to Sonia Delaunay's work.  Free.  Via della Stamperia, 6.

Piranesi - from his fantastica "jails" series.

Borromini's 17th-century frieze at
Accademia di San Luca, with an Ontani
sculpture in the niche inside.

This is one of several exhibition spaces behind the fountain. The main one is in Palazzo della Calcografia - an 18th-century building by Giuseppe Valadier.  A second one is in Palazzo Poli, with an entrance on the left side of the Trevi Fountain (as we recall), and which is considered to house the Trevi. Some of the space is devoted to a permanent exhibition of older print-making machines and explanations of the techniques then and today.  You might be lucky, too, as we were one day, to find yourself on the second floor of the palazzo and looking out the window right onto the fountain itself.

Across from Palazzo della Calcografia is the main building of Rome's exclusive arts academy - Accademia Nazionale di San Luca, founded in 1577.  In this palazzo, Palazzo Carpegna,you can simply walk in to see the famed Borromini ramp and friezes from the mid-17th century.  Prominent exhibits often are installed on the ramp and elsewhere throughout the building.  We've seen excellent architectural drawings by contemporary Italian Starchitect Renzo Piano,who also designed the New York Times headquarters in New York and the newer buildings at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.

That's Ontani in the shimmery pale blue silk
 suit and pony tail.  We caught a glimpse of
him touring his own exhibition
while we were doing so as well.

This summer the Accademia's primary installation is of works by an Italian sculptor and painter of whom we hadn't heard - Luigi Ontani. We found his capricious sculptures technically superb as well as fun and a bit bizarre. The exhibit is open until September 22 of this year. The building also houses a permanent exhibition of works donated by some of the famous members of the Academy, including Bernini.

Ontani's version of the lupa, Rome's she-wolf, with himself as the wolf.

Part of an Ontani sculpture channeling
Gertrude Stein.

Okay, advice on the Trevi Fountain.  Try to go very early in the morning or late at night.  Otherwise, it's a mob scene.  Don't try to wade in the fountain ala Anita Eckberg in La Dolce Vita.   There are police patrolling and pushing tourists to obey an unwritten code of conduct.  Eating lunch isn't in the code (see below).  Nor, for some of the fountain police, is sitting on the edge of the fountain. 

Trevi Fountain code police:
The couple is being told to put their food away.

Last photo - Curator and professor (Temple University, Rome) Shara Wasserman --she with the gold purse -- takes a group to the exhibition space in Accademia di San Luca.

Dianne

Rome's Modern Churches Are Worth the Trek - starting with San Pio da Pietralcino in Malafede



Some of most spectacular architecture in Rome is found in its churches, and that includes 21^st century architecture.  The Rome Diocese has commissioned dozens of new churches, most in lower- and middle-class neighborhoods on the periphery, to serve the spreading population and to deal with the departure of these classes from the historic center.

one block away

We began our exploration of these modern churches with the most famous one, Richard Meier’s Jubilee Church in the suburban neighborhood of Tor Tre Teste, which came in at #17 on RST's Top 40.  That was almost 4 years ago. RST's post on Meier’s church is still the most popular on the blog. We have visited many other churches since then, and made a push this past year to see 6 more.  Some are by famous architects, with Meier at the top of the list, and others by relative unknowns.  They are all fascinating, for their architecture as well as for the social insights they provide.

detail from San Pio statue
in the church

With this post, RST begins a series on these 21^st- century landmarks.  We start with a church in a middle-class suburb of no architectural distinction; a church plunked down in the middle of large apartment blocks; a church dedicated to the controversial saint, Padre Pio, whom some consider a charlatan.  

One of the newest of the dozens of new churches, the Church of San Pio da Pietralcina, in Malafede, south of Rome on the way to Fiumicino airport, has a striking set of flowing, uneven arches that define it. Our friend and art history professor Shara Wasserman (see her Contemporary Rome Web site) describes it as like the Shroud of Turin, flowing out.  Hmm, we’re not so sure, but it’s certainly distinctive.

What the roofline does inside may be even more impressive.  The siting of the choir against the back of the main arch, is lovely, even if it is furnished so far only with plastic chairs.

One of the more daring aspects of this church is the use of only nominal separation between the main body of the church and the side chapels.  Additional rchitectural details, such as the size of the arch and windows and the lattice work forming a type of separate ceiling, separate the side chapel from the main body of the church.

Only the railing  and a vestigial ceiling separate the side chapel from a walkway,
on one side, and the main worship space, on the other

The liturgical furnishings in the interior – such as the tabernacle holding the Eucharist, the baptismal receptacle, the priest’s chair, the altar, the Stations of the Cross – are designed in roughly hewn travertine, quarried locally (near Guidonia), a modern aesthetic. We noticed the few potted plants that have been placed next to some of these modernist pieces, relieving their starkness, probably to the dismay of the artist, Italian Giovanna De Sanctis Ricciardone (http://www.giovannadesanctis.com/cv.html). This decorating of stark modern pieces with more homey touches is something we see in most of the 21^s- century churches.

altar chair

lectern

Stations of the Cross

baptismal station

looking out from the church to the neighborhood;
 note the protective fencing

  The construction of this church in a new neighborhood, with a newly created parish, is consistent with the Rome Diocese’s efforts to spread its message.  The neighborhood sprang up around 2000, and the church was consecrated in late 2010, after 3 years of construction.  On the church Web site (link below), a writer notes that the area could have been considered a desert when families bought apartments here in 2000.  Malafede (meaning “bad faith”) was basically a neglected area, known in the past for pirates and malaria.  Again, the placement of this church follows the population and also is an acknowledgement by the Church that parishioners are moving away from the city into these somewhat wasteland-like suburbs.

A heavy gate guards the church grounds, as is the case in most of the 21^st-century churches.  The gates may be closed not only at night, but during that part of the day when the priest is not in the church; this is an unfriendly aspect of modern church management, though perhaps necessary to protect church property with dwindling religious personnel.

The church's namesake, Padre Pio, or Saint Pius, as he now is known, is extremely popular worldwide, and the parishioners here seem to like having a church in Rome dedicated to him.  We note the use of Pio and the church's distinctive roof design on church posters. 

This view from in back of the church also shows the parish buildings, 
again of modern and interesting design. 
 The gardeners found a good place to store their supplies.

The back of the church is as intriguing as the front.  Here one can see some of the features of the construction – the beams that hold that roof in place, as well as the gardeners trying to beat back the weeds and using space in the beams to store their equipment.

A view of the gardeners - unsuccessful in getting
 that mower running (and one wonders how it
would handle those weeds) - also shows how tightly
 the church is placed next to the apartment buildings. 

  

The architects for this unusual church structure were Anselmo e Associati.  We could find nothing about them, even though they have a Facebook page, except they are a northern firm, in the province of Lombardy, north of Milan.

We've included below some other photos, showing the requisite bell tower and some other views of the church, as well as some relevant links.

How to get there?  That’s an issue.  We went by scooter.  The church, at via Paolo Stoppa, 12, is half-way between via Cristoforo Colombo and via Ostiense/via del Mare, past the GRA, midway between the towns of Vitinia and Acilia.  One public transportation option is to take the Roma-Lido train from the station in Ostiense (the station is next to the Metro Piramide stop) past EUR to Vitinia and walk about 1.5 miles.  Some of that walk is along via del Mare; so hopefully there’s some kind of pedestrian space. This is one of those times (and we will say that for most of these churches) when a taxi may be in order.

Dianne

Some links:

The church’s Web site: http://www.spdp.it  It has flags for various languages, but they don’t seem to work.  Use a Google or other Web translator.

And there is a brief post on wikia: http://romanchurches.wikia.com/wiki/San_Pio_da_Pietrelcina

 

Artists' Colonies in Rome, Part 2: Piano Creativo ("Creative Floor")

Silvia Codignola was the first artist at Piano Creativo, and the only one of the original artists still there.

Artists hard at work:  that's the portrait of the artist colony we found at the end of the No. 8 Tram line, "Casaletto."  "Piano Creativo" (the "creative floor"), as the group refers to itself collectively, is testament to contemporary art being alive and well in Rome, despite decreasing support from the City or State.

Discussing their work with Luis Serrano, Flavia Dodi and
Sonia Cipollari - in Serrano's bright studio

On a Tuesday morning in June, six of the artists gave us some background on the artists' studios on one floor of a school, showed us their studios and many of their works - done and in process, and made us coffee.  What more can one ask?

The 1950s school building that hosts the artists' studios.

The artists generally (the exception is interesting and noted below) have not known each other before renting studios in the building, and only occasionally show their work together - one or two "open studios" each year.  The artists tend to come and go over time. The building was built as a school on private land owned by the Tozzi family- their "tenuta," or semi- rural land holdings in this southwest corner of suburban Rome.  It's an unusual early-1950s structure with enormous glass windows that are ideal for artists' studios, and interesting, given that the school was once a school for the blind.  In the '90s, with less demand for school space, some of the building was re-purposed; part of one floor was designated artists' studios.   Rent is reasonable - Euro 500-600/month for one studio, and the studios usually are shared by 2-3 artists.  There are a dozen artists now, and 8 studios.   As the photos reveal, the studios range from clean and well-organized to crowded and rather messy, what one would expect from a group of artists. 

Serrano with one of his "Bedding" series.

As Sonia Cipollari and Luis Serrano explained to us, almost all of the artists here have no other jobs and work hard all day, 5-6 days/ week, at their studios.  Historically, artists' studios were once on via Margutta, near the Spanish Steps, as portrayed in Roman Holiday and where the rents went sky-high as early as post WWII.  Then artists moved to other areas, such as San Lorenzo.  But artists now tend to be in collectives on the outskirts of Rome, such as Portonaccio, about which we wrote last year, and this area, at the outer end of Monteverde Nuovo.

Sonia described the "golden age" of contemporary art, in the late '90s until about 2003, when the City funded studios and shows.  No longer.  Now, we have heard, artists who want shows usually have to pay for the space, the opening party, the publicity, the catalog; something few contemporary artists can afford.  

Cipollari showing her water color technique.

      















Now artists depend on cultural institutions, such as Temple University's Rome campus, where Shara Wasserman has curated shows of independent artists, including this group.  Wassernman, who now has her own Web site, is perhaps the most knowledgeable curator of contemporary art in Rome.

Dodi describing her chromatic approach.

And, of course, to the art:  all of the work we saw at Piano Creativo was of a high level.  Luis Serrano showed us work from a recent show, "Bedding."  Flavia Dodi explained her mysterious paintings, some in black and white, others in "beautiful" color.  We sensed she prefers her more monochromatic pieces. Marcello Toma works with machinery and gears, in a neo-realist, post-Futurist vein, while his studio mate, Stefano Bolcato is using children's toy pieces (listen up, Fisher Price) to explore themes such as domestic violence and homosexuality.  Sonia Cipollari works in the difficult medium of watercolor on somewhat slick, slightly transparent paper, making her fascinating projects time-consuming, she told us.  We were particularly drawn to Silvia Codignola's sculpture and paintings, the latter evocative of the existential themes and styles of the 1930s and of the California work of David Hockney..  She uses a type of manikin figure to portray domestic scenes.  

Toma and work in process.

Cipollari shows photos of the sets for HBO's Rome series.

The exception noted above to the artists knowing each other before renting studios here is a group of 3 who worked together painting interior walls and ceilings, both de novo and restorations.  They had a successful project painting the Cinecitta' sets for the HBO Rome US TV series.  

The artists at Piano Creativo are open to visits. We suggest going during a weekday, perhaps between 10 a.m. and 5 p.m.  Take Tram 8 (now beginning at Largo di Torre Argentina, but shortly to begin at Piazza Venezia) to Casaletto (end of the line).


Bolcato points out the "wedding portrait" tipped over in his
scene of domestic violence.

Immediately on the right, at No. 420 viale Gianicolense, access "artisti" on the citofono by using the up and down arrows, and then press the bell sign below.  There's an elevator: they are on floor "2" , but 3 floors up, because you start on floor 1.    The Web site is: http://pianocreativo420.blogspot.it/.  There are links there to the individual artists' Web sites as well.

Buon viewing.  Dianne

From Codignola's domestic series.