The Exhibits

Visitors can project themselves into realities at times dreamt of, at other times feared, under the guidance of literary quotes that divide the exhibition into 12 sections – “visions” unveiled before visitors’ eyes as they gaze on the many urban identities which, while occasionally conflicting, are invariably designed to overcome the limitations innate in the organism that is the city.

Of the great names associated with painting, our inescapable starting point is Houses Under Construction by Umberto Boccioni, a key figure for the Futurist movement, who had a deep impact on the development of the arts in Europe in the first half of the 20th century; also on display are Giorgio de Chirico’s Piazza d’Italia, and Gerhard Richter’s Florence III/XII consisting of snapshots overlaid with painting in a technique developed by the artist.

The sculptors in the exhibition include Sol LeWitt, an American exponent of Minimal Art and builder of three-dimensional structures based on a rigidly logical system, conceptual in procedure, with an Irregular Tower. Also present in the exhibition is Michelangelo Pistoletto with his Third Paradise, an alluminium with a utopian echo for the section introduced by the words of Oscar Wilde, alongside a work by Dani Karavan entitled Partition (1973) and Alberto Burri’s White Crack.

The exploration of architecture features Le Corbusier (with, among other works, his Ville contemporaine for 3 millions d’habitants, dated 1922), Stefano Boeri, Rem Koolhaas, Pietro Porcinai, Giovanni Michelucci and Antonio Sant’Elia. The photography section, for its part, showcases work by Mimmo Jodice, Luigi Ghirri and Olivo Barbieri.

The exhibition also features video and contemporary music (Daniele Lombardi, Giuseppe Chiari, John Cage, Luciano Berio, Giuseppe Chiari and Bruno Maderna) collected by musicologist Francesco Bonomo, interpreting the city not simply as an urban agglomeration but as an organic expression where the noises of the city become that city’s voice.

The experience winds up with the projection of an original film by director Francesco Castellani, which offers the spectator room to question the multiplicity of urban identities.