At the Maramotti Collection, the art of Carlo Mollino revisited by Enoc Perez and Brigitte Schindler

From Oct. 4, 2020 to May 16, 2021, the Maramotti Collection in Reggio Emilia presents the exhibition Enoc Perez, Brigitte Schindler, Carlo Mollino: Mollino / Insides, a show that brings together paintings by Enoc Perez (San Juan, 1967) with photographs by Brigitte Schindler (Munich, 1972) and Carlo Mollino (Turin, 1905 - 1973). The exhibition opens with photographs of Mollino’s last residence on Via Napione in Turin (now the Museo Casa Mollino) seen through Perez’s brush and Schindler’s lens, and ends with Mollino’s photographs of models caught through the enigmatic essence of the imagery they inhabit.

Mollino, one of the most important Italian photographers of the twentieth century, carried out several researches on the female body, which became a recurring theme in the early part of his career: one remembers, in particular, his nudes in Polaroids of the 1960s, inspired by Surrealism. Mollino chose and prepared his sets, objects, clothes and accessories with scrupulous care, arranging his models in a unique and meticulously designed space in order to enhance the beauty of the subjects and suggest iconographies. With a visionary and experimental gaze, Mollino composed sophisticated and complex images that represented the female counterpart of his existence, an “army of butterflies” that was meant to complement his figure.

Mollino’s apartment on Via Napione, which he always kept secret, was rarely used as a photographic set: it was above all a private realm, conceived down to the smallest details so that it would reflect his personality. Traveling along an eclectic path, with content always being preceded by form, Mollino worked with the substance of the “necessary parenthesis” that was life for him, investigating the beauty of nature (and in particular human nature) in order to explore the deeper meanings of existence in our time and extend them into the beyond.

His visionary photography is thus now being reinterpreted by Enoc Perez and Brigitte Schindler. The former, a Puerto Rican, has researched the iconoclastic buildings of the 20th century and the role they played for the collective imagination as social metaphors of glamour and beauty. But at the same time, what seems to emerge from his paintings is the ghostly substance of the images: symbols that time has transfigured and transported to a more vague, almost dreamlike dimension. The Maramotti Collection has several works by this artist. The paintings depicting Casa Mollino spring from a visit conducted in September 2019: Perez transforms rooms into paintings by working from photographic images and adding new levels of reading and meaning.

Brigitte Schindler, as mentioned, also took inspiration from this house: the German artist’s photographs of Casa Mollino (exhibited for the first time on this occasion) capture the suspended mystery of this space and the connections between the objects that Mollino carefully chose and arranged. Through a balance of reflections, metamorphoses and revelations, Schindler’s visions lead the viewer along an aesthetic and conceptual path to discover Carlo Mollino’s complex world. Schindler focuses on the essence of seemingly insignificant details and how they can become clues and keys to open a door to new rooms of vision.

The exhibition is accompanied by a book with essays by Mario Diacono and Fulvio Ferrari and texts by Enoc Perez and Brigitte Schindler. Open Thursday through Sunday, Thursdays and Fridays from 2:30 to 6:30 p.m., Saturdays and Sundays from 10:30 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. Closed November 1, December 25 and 26, January 1 and 6, April 25 and May 1. For info visit the Maramotti Collection website.

Pictured is one of Carlo Mollino’s models.

At the Maramotti Collection, the art of Carlo Mollino revisited by Enoc Perez and Brigitte Schindler

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