Coming to the Scuderie del Quirinale a major exhibition on Italo Calvino and his relationship with the arts

As part of the celebrations of the centenary of the birth of Italo Calvino (Santiago de las Vegas, Cuba 1923 - Siena 1985), the Scuderie del Quirinale presents the major exhibition Fabulous Calvino. The World as a Work of Art. Carpaccio, de Chirico, Gnoli, Melotti and others. Curated by Mario Barenghi and organized by Scuderie del Quirinale with the publishing house Electa, the exhibition will be open to the public from Oct. 13, 2023 to Feb. 4, 2024, and is intended to be a journey through the figure and work of the writer, aimed both at the public of admirers and new readers, especially young people, who are now approaching Calvino’s work.

Special attention will be paid to Calvino’s relationship with the arts, which has never been investigated so fully in an exhibition, thanks in part to the support of national and international public and private institutions and numerous artists and collectors. The intent of the exhibition is above all to provide a panoramic representation of Calvino’s visual imagination, relating real environments and possible worlds, adventures of the gaze, visions, and theories.

The common thread will be precisely the visual dimension, beginning with that image “running around in the head” mentioned in one of Calvino’s most important self-comments, the 1960 Note to Our Ancestors. In the genesis of his works, the starting point is an image, “born who knows how,” which he carries around sometimes for years; gradually a story begins to develop from the image, which gradually reveals unexpected meanings and acquires meaning. Later, different factors will trigger Calvinian imagination: cosmological theories, tarot card arcana, everyday objects, works of art. However, the start from a visual cue remains constant, the slow work of writing of which reveals the potential by giving it the form of a story.

The large exhibition at the Scuderie del Quirinale will feature paintings, sculptures, drawings, illustrations by dozens of artists from the Renaissance to the present, medieval illuminated manuscripts, tapestries, armor, photographs and author portraits, all first editions of books and the most significant ones, with the aim of reconstructing the varied and multifaceted work of Italo Calvino. The exhibition-kaleidoscope, which makes use of more than four hundred loans, aims to be a necessary tribute to the work of an author who appears today more than ever exemplary for his curious and inquisitive attention to the most varied aspects of culture and reality, always managing to project himself resolutely into the future, even in the most problematic contexts, and therefore able to speak to contemporary consciousness.

The exhibition is organized in collaboration with the Region of Liguria and the City of Genoa with Fondazione Palazzo Ducale. Main sponsor American Express, with support from Fondazione Passadore 1888, sponsor Banca Passadore. Media partners Rai Cultura and Rai Radio 3.

The Roman exhibition is accompanied by Calvino cantafavole, an exhibition curated by Eloisa Morra and Luca Scarlini at Palazzo Ducale in Genoa, in the spaces of the Loggia degli Abati. The Genoa exhibition, supported by the Region of Liguria, the City of Genoa with Fondazione Palazzo Ducale, is organized by Electa in collaboration with Scuderie del Quirinale, Teatro della Tosse and Lele Luzzati Foundation. The exhibition will be open to the public from October 15, 2023 to April 7, 2024.

The publication of Mario Barenghi’s catalogue-guide to the exhibition is accompanied by Electa’s publishing production as part of the official program of the centenary celebrations of Calvino’s birth. On this occasion, the publishing house republishes a precious text, now unobtainable: Idem by Giulio Paolini, published in the “Einaudi letteratura” series in April 1975. The new edition houses an expanded and unpublished version of Calvino’s text entitled La squadratura. These titles are joined by the exhibition catalog Calvino cantafavole, edited by Eloisa Morra and Luca Scarlini, and the volume Calvino A-Z, edited by Marco Belpoliti, for the Encyclopedie series. It brings together 146 entries entrusted to 56 authors intended to provide a map for entering Calvino’s world, his books but also the themes, ideas, and events of his life as a writer.

For info: www.scuderiequirinale.it

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Coming to the Scuderie del Quirinale a major exhibition on Italo Calvino and his relationship with the arts

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