Brian Eno's lightboxes in dialogue with masterpieces at the National Gallery of Umbria

The halls of the National Gallery of Umbria in Perugia will host a solo exhibition entitled Reflected by Brian Eno (Woodbridge, 1948), a visual artist, composer and musician, from September 4, 2020 to January 10, 2021.

The three works on display will be in dialogue with masterpieces by the most significant artists in the museum’s collection: the Polyptych of St. Anthony by Piero della Francesca, the Guidalotti Polyptych by Beato Angelico, and Perugino’s Dead Christ in Pieta .

Inventor ofAmbient music and “musician-non-musician,” as he called himself, Brian Eno has always dedicated his artistic research to the union of various fields of inquiry. “Painting and music have always been intertwined for me,” Eno commented. “I started playing with light as a medium around the same time I started playing music as a teenager. When I think back on what I’ve done in the intervening years, I feel like I’ve tried to slow music down to make it more like painting, and give movement to images to bring them closer to music ... in the hope that the two activities would meet and merge in the middle.”

The exhibition intends to present a novel dialogue between ancient masterpieces and Brian Eno’s Lightboxes: the latter are developed through combinations of self-generated “color landscapes” using interwoven LED lights. Eno’s intention is to make the audience linger in the room for a while, extending temporal boundaries with a work that seemingly has no beginning or end. “If a painting is hanging on a wall,” the artist says, “we don’t feel that we are missing something if we divert our attention. Instead, with music and video, we still have the expectation of some kind of spectacle, of storytelling. My music and videos change, but they change slowly. And they change in such a way that it doesn’t matter to lose any part of it.”

The exhibition will also feature a silkscreen print by British artist Tom Phillips (London, 1937), titled Raphael Revisited (2011). The work is inspired by a votive tablet, datable to the late 15th century, by an anonymous Umbrian painter previously identified as a very young Raphael (preserved at the Walker Art Gallery in Liverpool) that will be used by Eno for the cover of his album Another Green World.

The exhibition is organized in collaboration with Atlante Servizi Culturali.

For info: gallerianazionaledellumbria.it

Hours: Wednesday, Thursday and Friday from 2 to 7:30 p.m.; Saturday and Sunday from 8:30 a.m. to 7:30 p.m. Closed Mondays and Tuesdays.

Tickets: Full 8 euros, reduced 2 euros for 18-25 year olds.

Ph.Credit Shiraishi Masami. Courtesy Paul Stolper Gallery (2020)

Brian Eno's lightboxes in dialogue with masterpieces at the National Gallery of Umbria

Warning: the translation into English of the original Italian article was created using automatic tools. We undertake to review all articles, but we do not guarantee the total absence of inaccuracies in the translation due to the program. You can find the original by clicking on the ITA button. If you find any mistake,please contact us.