Sociality in Italy between Art Nouveau and Art Deco: works by the great masters of the 20th century in Seravezza

Palazzo Mediceo in Seravezza (Lucca) reopens to the public, after air-conditioning works in the exhibition rooms, with the exhibition Social-e. Images of Sociality in Italy between Art Nouveau and Art Deco, curated by Nadia Marchioni. The exhibition is intended to be a long journey through images in the different forms of expression of the 20th century and, by bringing together works by the major Italian artists of the century from the collections of the Massimo and Sonia Cirulli Foundation, it aims to offer a view on some aspects of our culture and sociality, such as travel, entertainment, exhibitions, sports, daily life, parties and meetings in the city. The exhibition is open to the public from July 10 to October 10, 2021.

“The exhibition stems from reflecting on how irreplaceable is the direct confrontation,” says the curator, “the sharing of places, values, cultural experiences, of what abyss opens before our eyes, deprived for a long time of the small or great happiness offered by a trip, a visit to the museum, a show at the theater or cinema, a meeting, a walk in the countryside, by the sea or in our beloved cities, whose streets and squares deserted by people and sounds will not be easily forgotten.”

Divided into eight sections, the exhibition displays paintings, sculptures, projects and the posters of major artists of the 20th century. Themes addressed are the various expressions of social and cultural life in the 20th century: cinema, theater, museums and exhibitions, tourism, sports, travel, and meeting occasions, to emphasize how important they were to the artists of the time.

The exhibition offers a room entirely dedicated to the theme of cities, with a city view by Luigi Gigiotti Zanini. This section also features works by Galileo Chini and great Italian illustrators, such as Marcello Dudovich. Two rooms, on the other hand, are devoted to theater, through some graphic works and a maquette for the sets of the Greek theater of Syracuse by Roman artist Duilio Cambellotti and posters devoted to opera theater, such as the one created for a performance of Puccini’s Tosca by Leopoldo Metlicovitz, one of the fathers of modern Italian poster art. In the room devoted to travel, a scenographic poster by Mario Sironi and drawings by architect Arrigo Cantoni, never before exhibited, for Milan’s New Railway Station stand out, as well as major early 20th-century exhibitions such as the 1902International Exhibition of Modern Decorative Art in Turin, for which Leonardo Bistolfi created an Art Nouveau poster, featured in the exhibition, that has remained in the history of Italian poster design. Two other rooms are devoted to town meetings and sports, respectively: in the first, many advertisements for iconic products and department stores of the time created by well-known masters of advertising graphics such as Leonetto Cappiello and Adolfo Hohenstein; in the second, photos, graphic and pictorial works created for various sporting events. Among the artists on display are Thayaht and Ram, brothers and eclectic Florentine artists who had fruitful relations with Versilia.

Image: Leonardo Bistolfi, First International Exhibition of Modern Decorative Art, poster (1902)

Sociality in Italy between Art Nouveau and Art Deco: works by the great masters of the 20th century in Seravezza

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