Giambattista Piranesi's Prisons are on display in Puglia

From December 15 to May 5, 2019, one of the greatest Italian artists of the eighteenth century, Giambattista Piranesi (Mogliano Veneto 1720 - Rome 1778), engraver, architect and architectural theorist, author of some of the most influential series of engravings of his time and beyond, is the protagonist of an exhibition in Puglia entitled Giovanni Battista Piranesi. Prisons of Invention, hosted at two venues: Palazzo de’ Mari in Acquaviva delle Fonti (Bari) and Caracciolo Castle in Sammichele di Bari (Bari).

The exhibition is dedicated to one of Piranesi’s most famous and evocative series, that of the Prisons, in which the canonical representation of the prison is revolutionized. Piranesi conceived it between 1745 and 1750 when, at the age of 25, he had settled in Rome: with deep interests in architecture and archaeology, he worked on a series of panels depicting unparalleled, highly dramatic environments, the result of excited imagination combined with a careful knowledge of form and architectural fabric. Endless halls, distant vaults, immense and yet claustrophobic and inhibiting spaces, in which the endless repetition of openings, spaces and steps, the tangle of volumes and maze recall a psychological prison almost more than a physical one. The real impossibility of escape, of getting out of the Prisons, is given by their labyrinthine essence, by the intersection of staircases that lead nowhere, elements that have influenced Romantic artists, Surrealists, up to contemporaries, starting with the Dutchman Escher.

The exhibition itinerary, which can be visited with a single ticket for the two venues, concludes with an engaging video that offers 3-D “recreations” of Piranesi’s prisons. The video was made by Gregoire Dupont ofMadrid’s Atelier Factum Arte (the same one that made, for example, the faithful reproduction of Caravaggio’s Nativity in Palermo), through a stereolithographic process. It has been exceptionally loaned by the Giorgio Cini Foundation of Venice, owner of the Piranesi Fréres edition of the engravings, from which it was taken.

Hours: Saturdays from 4:30 pm to 7:30 pm, Sundays and holidays from 10:30 am to 1 pm and 4:30 pm to 7:30 pm. Last admission 30 minutes before closing. Possibility to book special openings (tel. 0744 422848 or email to callcenter@sistemamuseo.it). Tickets: full 6 euros, reduced 3 euros (children and young people aged 6 to 18, groups of at least 15 people). Free for disabled and accompanying person, children up to 5 years, accredited journalists, accompanying teacher of school groups. The exhibition is organized by Sistema Museo Company, manager of the Peucetia Ecomuseum SAC, and promoted by the municipalities of Acquaviva delle Fonti and Sammichele di Bari, with the contribution of The Art Company. For more information you can visit thePeucetia Ecomuseum website or www.mostrepuglia.it.

Image: Giovanni Battista Piranesi, Arcata ornata da conchiglia, from the series Carceri d’invenzione, sixth edition (1745-1761; etching)

Giambattista Piranesi's Prisons are on display in Puglia

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