Marina Abramović returns to Naples after 16 years: from September she is on display at Castel dell'Ovo

Serbian artist Marina Abramović (Belgrade, 1946), the so-called "godmother of performance art," returns to Naples for the third time in her career: she will do so with the exhibition Marina Abramović / Ecstasy, already successfully presented last year in Milan. The exhibition will be held at Castel dell’Ovo from September 18 and will be curated by critic Giuseppe Frangi: in the Sala delle Carceri, the Neapolitan public will be able to see the cycle The Kitchen. Homage to saint Therese, consisting of three large videos documenting the three performances Abramović made in 2009 in the former convent of La Laboral in Gijón, Spain, dedicated to Saint Therese of Àvila, the well-known Spanish mystic.

The performer thus returns to the city after sixteen years since her last appearance: it was 2004 when, at the Lia Rumma Gallery, she arrived with the project Cleaning the mirror, which featured a 1995 performance of hers during which she cleaned a skeleton and then made it move by placing it on her body. Remaining an important piece of art history is the first Neapolitan performance, one of the highlights of Marina Abramović’s career and of performance art in general: it was 1974 and the artist was performing, on the premises of Studio Morra, in the celebrated Rhythm 0, the action during which the artist, for six hours, had arranged herself in the center of a room placing a series of instruments (which could have caused her pleasure, pain or even death) at the disposal of the audience, which also sparked a brawl among the participants and would later be defined by Marina Abramović as her strongest experience.

“We are happy and honored to have back in Naples a testimony of the great international artist Marina Abramović, who precisely in our city realized one of her most famous performances in the 1970s,” said the mayor of Naples, Luigi De Magistris. “The energy of culture will be essential to recover the fullness of living after this planetary emergency. We believe it is also important today to invest in a vision of serene normality of the near future.”

“We would like to announce, with the anticipation that we believe deserves an extraordinary appointment on our city’s cultural agenda, an exhibition event of works by Marina Abramović paying homage to St. Teresa of Avila,” says Culture and Tourism Councillor Eleonora De Majo. "The exhibition Ecstasy, a project of international scope and extraordinary emotional value that ideally compares, at a distance of about five centuries, two women of different but intense humanity who, in a time of deep suspension like the one we are living, suggest an almost mystical experience, certainly of great emotional charge. An exhibition that we want to give to our city that is slowly restarting. A project that is in itself an invitation to the rediscovery of our territories and the exceptional cultural offerings they provide, an incentive to recall the need for a tourism that, in the short term, will be above all proximity-based. Therefore, thanks to Vanitas Club, Naples and Southern Italy will be able to enjoy this exceptional exhibition."

“Marina Abramović returns to Naples, the city to which she is also linked thanks to her relationship with the Lia Rumma Gallery,” emphasizes curator Giuseppe Frangi. "A partnership that confirms the centrality of the Neapolitan city in the contemporary art system. In 2004 in the spaces of Via Gaetani the artist had presented an exhibition that took its title from another of his famous performances, Cleaning the Mirror."

Marina Abramović returns to Naples after 16 years: from September she is on display at Castel dell'Ovo

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