The works ... escape from the museum. The bizarre photos of Dario Assisi and Riccardo Maria Cipolla at the MANN in Naples.


From Dec. 2, 2019 to Feb. 24, 2020, the National Archaeological Museum in Naples is hosting the project Escape from the Museum

From Dec. 2, 2019 to Feb. 24, 2020, the National Archaeological Museum of Naples will host the project Fuga dal Museo, a photographic exhibition by Dario Assisi and Riccardo Maria Cipolla based on a smile and lightness. In fact, the two artists present at the MANN forty photomontages to imagine what the “life” of the sculptures would be like if they “escaped” from the MANN (after all, even works of art, thanks to the power of imagination, move), forwarding along the streets, squares and the most characteristic corners of Naples.

After the success of the exhibition Fantasmi a Pompei, in which the figures of the MANN’s mosaics and frescoes were transposed, again thanks to photomontage, to the excavations of the ancient city of Vesuvius, the new creative path followed by Assisi and Cipolla aims to be a true act of love for the city of Naples: Castel dell’Ovo, the waterfront, Piazza del Plebiscito, the Petraio, the alleys of the historic center, but also bus shelters and subway cars, will become the background for a new temporal and visual short-circuit.

Thus, in the liveliness of the metropolitan horizon, it may happen to encounter the sculpture of the crouching Aphrodite in vico Lungo Gelso, admire the dynamic power of the Farnese Bull in harmonious dialogue with a stormy sky, collide with the Doriphorus in the Line 1 station at the Museum. Not missing from the roll call will be Canova’s masterpieces, which were on display at the Archeological Museum on the occasion of the retrospective on the master from Possagno: the Dancer with her hands on her hips will find, in vico san Domenico, a new space for a symbolic display, while Cupid and Psyche standing will embrace tenderly in the Real Orto Botanico. The guiding image of the Escape from the Museum exhibition will beCapua’s Aphrodite: only through creativity will the famous sculpture from the Farnese Collection emerge to hang out laundry, finding harmony and lightness of gesture in the everyday dimension of an ordinary morning of the third millennium.

“Our project,” Assisi and Cipolla explain, “stems from the desire to bring the MANN statues to life, making them real creatures that interact with reality. The sculptures become people, wandering around the city, eager to discover its mysteries, beauties and fears.” For more information you can visit the MANN Naples website.

Pictured: the photomontage with the Aphrodite of Capua.

The works ... escape from the museum. The bizarre photos of Dario Assisi and Riccardo Maria Cipolla at the MANN in Naples.
The works ... escape from the museum. The bizarre photos of Dario Assisi and Riccardo Maria Cipolla at the MANN in Naples.


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