In Cinisello Balsamo, the Museum of Contemporary Photography reopens and resumes its exhibitions

After discontinuing its exhibition activities as of March 30, 2022, announced in a note explaining that the decision was part of the institutional transformation process the museum was going through, connected to the broader broader project of the birth in Milan of the National Museum of Photography wanted by the Ministry of Culture and Triennale Milano, in collaboration with the Lombardy Region and the historical founders Municipality of Cinisello Balsamo and Metropolitan City of Milan, Mufoco - Museum of Contemporary Photography, at the Villa Ghirlanda venue in Milan - Cinisello Balsamo reopens its doors on Saturday, October 22 with a rich program of exhibitions and talks.

Two exhibitions can be visited starting at 3 p.m. on Oct. 22, accompanied by two in-depth talks: Landscape after Landscape. Photographs by Andrea Botto, Claudio Gobbi, Stefano Graziani, Giovanni Hänninen, Sabrina Ragucci, and Filippo Romano, and Biomega by Cosimo Veneziano. The former, curated by Matteo Balduzzi, will be on view until January 29, 2023.In the museum’s collections, the theme of landscape has had and still maintains an extremely significant presence, both from a symbolic point of view (the museum project itself takes its start from the Archivio dello spazio experience that involved 58 photographers between 1988 and 1997) and especially because of the seminal role that the photography of places has played in the evolution of Italian photography since the 1980s. An initial important nucleus of images preserved at the Museum is represented by works by those who are now considered the great masters of Italian and European photography. To this, a further varied nucleus of works has gradually been aggregated in more recent years, by authors belonging to new generations who have been confronted with an ever-expanding notion of landscape. These authors have been acquired by following different lines of research: a series of participatory projects and works of public art; a series of commissions reserved for younger generations; the production or acquisition of important works made by some important authors who were not present in the Museum’s collections, artists belonging to a kind of generation-hierarchy, born between the mid 1960s and mid-1970s, who were formed in a direct line with the tradition of Italian landscape photography but then extended its practices and languages in less orthodox directions, consistent with the evolution of the international context. To this latter group belong the works of the six artists who make up the exhibition: Andrea Botto, Claudio Gobbi, Stefano Graziani, Giovanni Hänninen, Sabrina Ragucci, and Filippo Romano. Authors who have elaborated over the years a research that is now recognized nationally and internationally, consistently experimenting with languages and practices that reflect on the landscape from novel and often surprising perspectives. The projects, made between 2010 and 2020, were acquired in 2021 thanks to the Photography Strategy call promoted by MIC’s Directorate General for Contemporary Creativity (DGCC) and are now on public display for the first time. The exhibition presents more than 100 works in total.

Cosimo Veneziano’s installation Biomega, curated by Lisa Parola, constitutes the concluding moment of a long and articulated transdisciplinary project that the artist started in 2016 and that, starting from the use of biotechnology in agribusiness, reflects on central contemporary issues such as the relationship between art and nature and, in particular, between cultivation, globalization, consumption, marketing and image. In this process, a fundamental role is played by the photographic image, which digital processing has made increasingly performant on an aesthetic level, and by visual perception, investigated through sophisticated neuromarketing techniques in order to guide consumer behavior and choice. The entire work, which consists of an installation composed of silkscreens and embroidery on fabric, is intended to invite the public to question aspects that we experience every day. “Products are presented and sold through advertising images (usually taken from stock photo databases), especially food products, with which we feed ourselves daily. We have even reached a level where the text very often has become an appendix, everything goes through them.” The work was carried out with the collaboration of the Brain Lab. Department of Neuroscience at IULM University in Milan. The work was acquired by the museum at the end of the project, which was carried out thanks to the support of the DGCC of the Ministry of Culture under the seventh edition of the Italian Council program (2019) and promoted by Fondazione Sardi Per l’Arte and the Arteco Association of Turin. A volume published by Nero editions accompanies the exhibition.

For info: http://www.mufoco.org/

In Cinisello Balsamo, the Museum of Contemporary Photography reopens and resumes its exhibitions

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