Abstractionism and informalism in the Olivetti Collection: the exhibition in Ivrea

At the P.A. Civic Museum. Garda in Ivrea(Turin), the penultimate exhibition of the exhibition cycle Olivetti and Culture in Responsible Enterprise launched in 2021 through an agreement signed by the Municipality of Ivrea, Associazione Archivio Storico Olivetti, Olivetti S.p.A and TIM S.p.A. Abstractionism and Informalism in the Olivetti Collection and the Civic Collection, this is the title of the exhibition, hosts more than 90 works, with a layout designed to highlight each painting.

The exhibition presents an articulated panorama of the new art languages that emerged in Italy from the 1950s to the early 1990s. Abstract and informal artworks in the Olivetti collection will dialogue with contemporary works from the civic collection. The exhibition will be an opportunity to discover an almost totally unseen artistic heritage of the City of Ivrea.

A corporate collection and a public collection, born in different ways and for different purposes but sometimes converging on certain artists. The exhibition kicks off with works by Picabia, Balla and Kandiskij and Miró, with references to futurism and the varied roots of abstractionism.Abstractionism, in its various forms, eschews the representation of phenomenal reality, and makes room for the phenomenology of the unconscious, the symbols of the spirit, denying or distorting its forms, exploring new relationships between image and reality, in a more lyrical direction on the one hand and more geometric on the other.

In the postwar period, artists including Wols, influenced by the researches of psychoanalysis, the Surrealist investigation of automatism, and existentialist philosophy, began to systematically pursue the negation of form as a clearly defined, drawn and designed entity, to bring out, instead, the most unconscious individual impulses. Informal art is born, which in fact does not want to represent external forms and phenomena. To the centrality of form the artist thus prefers the centrality of matter. Not only matter, but then also sign and gesture are the cornerstones of informal art and prevail differently depending on the artist.

The exhibition path does not presume to be able to illustrate the multifaceted and varied evolution of the various movements and groups that developed from the postwar period and up to the threshold of the 1990s, if anything, to bring to light and highlight the conscious choices or sometimes randomness that determined the purchase or donation of some significant works.

In the postwar years he focuses on the figure of Spazzapan in Turin, abstruse but never abstract in the pure sense of the term. The artist called his art a “rabesco mixed with expression,” and in his “geometric compositions” the iconic element (cats, horses, gurus or mechanisms of wheels and spokes) still prevails most often.

In the Italian panorama, exhibitions are of fundamental importance in giving visibility to new developments and new artistic trends, and, for the shaping of the Olivetti collection, theimportance of the 1955 Prato one Sixty masters of the next thirty years, organized by Carlo Ludovico Ragghianti, in which artists such as Redento Bontadi, Enzo Brunori, Piero Dorazio, Mario Lattes, Alvaro Monnini, Mattia Moreni, Emilio Scanavino, and Sergio Vacchi exhibited, whose works can be seen in the show.

Particularly outstanding is the figure of Mattia Moreni, who in 1954 worked for the Olivetti company on a mural composition for the large glazed atrium of Milan’s Palazzo Olivetti on Via Clerici, of which the oil on panel displayed in the exhibition is the only surviving work. It was part of a large wall panel measuring about 6 meters (20 feet) that also included a black anodized aluminum element that connected it to the rectilinear motifs of the exterior cladding. A complex “tale” of at least 8 elements to build a large unique work in the entrance hall of the Milanese palace.

Works by Eva Fischer, Ennio Morlotti, and Tancredi Parmeggiani also date from the second half of the 1950s.

Refocusing on the Turin movements, the exhibition includes works by Annibale Biglione and Filippo Scroppo, who were among the founders of the Concrete Art Movement in Turin.

The 1960s find representation in works by artists of very different tendencies including Ettore Fico, Piero Ruggeri and Giorgio Ramella. There is no lack of connections with an expanded and more international view through the personalities of Pierre Alechinsky and Hans Hartung.

Expressions of Piedmontese artists such as Mauro Maulini to international artists such as Walter Ballmer, Gabino Amadeo, and Pedro Coronel are flashes of different coeval but very different artistic pursuits that characterize the 1970s.

A nucleus of works by Tony Arch that constitute an important donation to the Eporedes civic museum and lead us to the threshold of the 2000s.

“With Abstractionism and Informalism in the Olivetti Collection and the Civic Collection continues the program of exhibitions that the Administration, with the Culture Department, has proposed to citizens, visitors, and tourists in recent years. The dialogue between works from the Olivetti Collection and the Civic Collection is certainly a way of mutual enhancement and strengthening interest in the exhibition. Kudos to all those who have worked tirelessly for this new milestone,” argues Mayor, Stefano Sertoli.

Culture Councillor, Avv. Costanza Casali states, “It is with great enthusiasm that the City of Ivrea inaugurates the fifth exhibition of the Olivetti and Culture in Responsible Enterprise cycle, after the success of the previous ones. The exhibition relates artworks related to abstractionism and informal art present in the Olivetti Collection and the Civic Collection of the Garda Museum. The sensitivity and attention of the Olivetti Company to perceive the changes that were taking place in society and in artistic experiences was fundamental so that there were acquisitions of works that went beyond the actual representation of objects by drawing inspiration from science, technology and philosophy, also reflecting the anxieties of society. The Olivetti Art Collection was thus able to be enriched with numerous unique pieces featuring artists of the caliber of Balla, whose paintings can now be admired in this wonderful exhibition. I invite everyone to come and visit it.”

In addition, Gaetano di Tondo, President of the Olivetti Historical Archives Association and VP, Director of Communications and External Relations Olivetti adds “After the great success of the previous four, we have arrived at the penultimate exhibition of the itinerary born in 2021 from the joint and fruitful work between TIM, Olivetti, the Municipality of Ivrea, the Olivetti Historical Archives Association and the Garda Museum, which allows the people of Ivrea and all lovers of art and culture to be able to admire another relevant part of the Olivetti collection. At the center of the narrative path are works of abstract and informal art, both Italian and international, another piece of this long narrative that reaffirms the value of culture as a strategic tool of the company and as a factor in the cultural growth of society. Previous exhibitions have also confirmed the ability to be an additional driver of attraction, an excellent opportunity for more than just proximity tourism for the Canavese territory.”

For all information, you can visit the official website of the P.A. Civic Museum. Garda.

Pictured: Giacomo Balla, Compenetration and Light (1920; oil on canvas)

Abstractionism and informalism in the Olivetti Collection: the exhibition in Ivrea

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