Morandi's objects. Real: Joel Meyerowitz's Morandi photos on display in Bologna

Running from January 30 to February 25, 2024 in the halls of the Collezioni Comunali d’Arte in Bologna ’s Palazzo d’Accursio is the exhibition Morandi’s Objects. The Photographs of Joel Meyerowitz dedicated to Giorgio Morandi (Bologna, 1890 - 1964) and curated by Giusi Vecchi. The exhibition is one of five special projects in the current edition of ART CITY Bologna, the institutional program of exhibitions, events and special initiatives promoted by the City of Bologna in collaboration with BolognaFiere on the occasion of Arte Fiera, February 2 to 4, 2024, that explore and reinterpret the artist’s work on the 60th anniversary of his death through different languages of the contemporary.

Morandi’s Objects. The Photographs of Joel Meyerowitz introduces to the universe of Giorgio Morandi through the gaze of photographer Joel Meyerowitz, presenting a selection of 17 shots that the celebrated U.S. photographer has donated to the Morandi Museum in the past. Meyerowitz had already paid tribute to the Museum in 2015 by donating a work from Morandi’s Objects cycle , triptych, Flag, to which he recently added another 22 photographs from the same series. Joel Meyerowitz was given access to the studio room at Casa Morandi, Via Fondazza 36 in Bologna, in order to provide a catalog of the objects the painter used throughout his life. Through more than 700 shots, Meyerowitz made a thorough taxonomic survey of all the objects of various materials kept in the small room where Morandi lived and worked. True portraits that flowed into the valuable volume Morandi’s Objects published by Damiani in 2015, they make explicit the expressive power of each individual object, revealing their subtle characteristics, their absolute singularity and the magnetism that Morandi first experienced when painting them on canvas.

“I sat at Giorgio Morandi’s table in exactly the same place he had sat for more than 40 years. The same slant of light shone on that table for me as it did then for him. I watched it grow and radiate little by little for two days in the spring of 2015. One by one, more than 260 objects he had collected passed through my hands. The dust with which they are covered is an integral part of that mystery that Morandi handed down to us intact. As if in a new carousel, the objects paraded back onto the table. I wonder: what is the secret of these objects that kept Morandi under their power throughout his life?” explains Joel Meyerowitz.

Notes on the artist

Joel Meyerowitz was born in 1938 in New York City and began photographing in 1962. Although he always considered himself a street photographer in the tradition of Henri Cartier-Bresson and Robert Frank (he co-authored the standard work on the genre Bystander: A History of Street Photography, 1994) he transformed this mode with his pioneering use of color. Considered, along with William Eggleston and Stephen Shore, to be one of the most representative exponents of New Color Photography in the 1960s and 1970s, Meyerowitz was instrumental in changing attitudes toward the use of color photography from resistance to almost universal acceptance. His first book Cape Light (1978) is a much-loved classic of color photography and has sold more than 150,000 copies. Also in Wild Flowers (1983) he demonstrated an appreciation for the fusion of nature and artifice in ordinary city streets. Later he turned to portraits, 1991’s Redheads and 2003’s Landscape Tuscany: Inside the Light. More recently, he spent three years capturing wilderness areas in New York City parks. Selections from the project were exhibited at the Museum of the City of New York (2009-2010) and were published in Legacy: The Preservation of Wilderness in New York City Parks (Aperture, 2009). Meyerowitz was the only photographer granted unimpeded access to Ground Zero after the September 11, 2001 attacks. The images, many of which were collected in the volume Aftermath: World Trade Center Archive, formed the foundation of a major national archive and a traveling exhibition that has traveled to more than 200 cities in 60 countries.

Over the course of his career, Meyerowitz has produced more than a dozen books, and in 2010 Phaidon published a comprehensive review of his career. He also produced and directed his first film, Pop, an intimate diary of a three-week road trip with his son Sasha and elderly father Hy, in 1998. His first major solo exhibitions included those at the Eastman House in Rochester in 1966 and the Museum of Modern Art in New York in 1968. He represented the United States at the Venice Architecture Biennale in 2002 and has received more than a dozen awards, including the Guggenheim Fellowship and the Deutscher Fotobuchpreis. His works are in major public and private collections, including Museum of Modern Art (New York), Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York), Whitney Museum of American Art (New York), Museum of Fine Arts (Boston) and The Art Institute of Chicago.

Practical Information.

Hours of operation: Tuesday, Thursday 2 p.m. - 7 p.m., Wednesday, Friday 10 a.m. - 7 p.m., Saturday, Sunday, holidays 10 a.m. - 6:30 p.m. Closed non-holiday Mondays Opening hours during ART CITY Bologna (February 1 - 4, 2024): Thursday Feb. 1 2 p.m. - 7 p.m., Friday Feb. 2 10 a.m. - 7 p.m., Saturday Feb. 3 10 a.m. - 10 p.m., Sunday Feb. 4 10 a.m. - 6:30 p.m. Admission: Full € 6 | reduced € 4 | reduced special youth between 19 and 25 years € 2 | free Culture Card holders - Admission during ART CITY Bologna (February 1 - 4, 2024) Free

Morandi's objects. Real: Joel Meyerowitz's Morandi photos on display in Bologna

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