The Gypsotheca Antonio Canova Museum in Possagno hosts the exhibition n until 29 September 2024
eated by the photographic research project “Canova Quattro Tempi” by Luigi Spina. The story, the result of four photographic campaigns carried out year after year, began in 2019 and gave life to as many publications published by 5 Continents Editions, accompanied by texts by Vittorio Sgarbi. The third volume recently won the gold medal for best art book awarded by the ICMA – International Editorial-Design & Research Forum. On the occasion of this exhibition, the fourth and final volume of the editorial project is published.
For the exhibition Luigi Spina has selected 32 large format black and white photographs, among the most representative of the love, mythological and heroic themes present in the Gypsotheca of Possagno, proposing them in dialogue with the works of Canova exhibited in the Gemin Wing of the Gypsotheca itself .
The images capture the creative moment of the Artist, the one in which the idea is transformed into form and plaster: the moment in which genius is measured against the limits of the material, trying to shape it, modify it, subject it to the desired form.
Each of Spina’s four stories leads the gaze through the density of the plaster, bringing out every possible detail and posture of the sculptures, the lead nails on the plasters, the repère points, become a code for reading the works. “My purpose”, states Spina, “is to reclaim the contemporaneity of the classic, its transversal nature in every era”.
Spina’s interpretations accompany the reference Canova plaster casts in the exhibition. Here are the images of the dancers alongside the Canova dancer, real and ideal portraits in dialogue with their respective
photographs, the Master’s Peace and Magdalene compared with contemporary images.
“These works”, announces the director Moira Mascotto, “will become part of the heritage of the Possagno Museum with the ambition, once the exhibition is concluded, to give life to new exhibition projects with important national and international museum institutions with which we are already in dialogue. The project will thus become a messenger of the Museum and of Canova’s genius and, at the same time, will give rise to new virtuous collaborations”.
“The Canova. Quattro Tempi project immediately excited me for several reasons. As the son of a sculptor, I am always enchanted by the magic of the creative investigation from which everything originates, in the form and in the emotion it arouses,” says Eric Ghysels, publisher of 5 Continents Editions. “A process that brings to mind when, as a child, I would gradually see a work being shaped from raw material. Being able to observe up close and help make the general public aware, through Luigi Spina’s photos, of the concreteness and expressiveness of Canova’s plaster casts, so full of life, makes me feel privileged. These works carry within them the enchantment of conception, which occurs – just like in life – through a succession of phases. A process that I compare to the gestation of a book, which fascinates me, as a publisher, because it allows me to experience what happens “behind the scenes”, in all the phases of its evolution, up to printing. The volumes I publish are works in progress, which grow thanks also to the competence and passion of other traveling companions.”
The mayor of Possagno, Valerio Favero, continues: “I would like to thank the Hon. Vittorio Sgarbi, 5 Continents Editions and Fondazione Pallavicino for their support and collaboration in this important project, which through the sensitivity of Luigi Spina will allow us to grasp the nuances and fascinating details of the Maestro’s works, contained within our museum. I am certain that the quality of the work carried out and the exhibition itinerary will be able to give visitors a new and extremely valuable experience”.
The President of the Canova Foundation, Massimo Zanetti, concludes: “Through the photographs of Luigi Spina, who enhances and interprets the neoclassical with a contemporary look, Canova’s art comes to life in one shot, transmitting the creative moment of the artist as he shaped the ‘idea in chalk’.
LUIGI SPINA born in Santa Maria Capua Vetere in 1966. His main fields of research are amphitheatres, the civic sense of the sacred, the links between art and faith, ancient cultural identities, the comparison with classical sculpture, the obsessive research on the sea, the cassettes of the dreaming archaeologist (Giorgio Buchner). He has published over twenty photographic books of personal research and has created prestigious photographic campaigns for institutions and museums. Among the volumes published, in various languages and distributed throughout the world, we can mention the project on the Roman Forum, L’Ora Incerta, Electaphoto (2014); Faces of Rome at the Centrale Montemartini, Silvana Editoriale (2019); and also The Buchner Boxes (2014), The Dancers of the Villa of the Papyri (2015), Mythical Diary, Visual Chronicles of the Farnese Collection (2017), The Brothers (2020), Sing Sing, the Body of Pompeii (2020), Riace Bronzes (2022) and Pompeian Interior (2023) all published by 5 Continents Editions. The famous magazine MATADOR, Fabrica Madrid, dedicated the cover and the central article of issue T to him.
In 2020, the authoritative magazine Artribune awarded him the title of best photographer of the year. In 2022, he was among the finalists of the 73rd Michetti Prize for Contemporary Art and winner of the Digital Michetti Prize. In 2023, he was awarded the Amedeo Maiuri International Prize for Photography.
The museum. Gypsotheca Antonio Canova Museum – Possagno (TV). The Antonio Canova Gypsotheca Museum in Possagno is the place that preserves the historical and artistic legacy of Antonio Canova (Possagno, 1757–Venice, 1822), the greatest sculptor of the neoclassical period.
The museum complex is composed of the Birthplace and the Gyspotheca, located in the original basilica (1836) and in the extension designed by Carlo Scarpa (1957), which collects the original plaster models from which the marbles found today were translated in the most important museums in the world. The artist’s paintings, drawings, engravings and personal effects are kept in his birthplace.
The Museum offers visitors a variety of experiences: from guided tours to educational workshops, to candlelit night tours.
Carlo Franza