The 1980s, decade of special effects, told in an exhibition in Milan

The Galleria Gruppo Credito Valtellinese - Refettorio delle Stelline in Milan will offer from December 20, 2018 to February 23, 2019 the exhibition, curated by Cristina Quadrio Curzio and Leo Guerra with scientific advice from Valentino Catricalà and Mario Piazza, dedicated to the 1980s.

It was Umberto Eco who called the 1980s the"decade of special effects," and Reality 80 The Decade of Special Effects, the title of the exhibition, refers precisely to this definition.

The exhibition is developed through a continuous interweaving of stories and figures from those years, within chronological and thematic subdivisions of events, such as the assassination attempt on Pope Wojtyla in 1981, the PSI congress at Ansaldo in ’89 and the fall of the Berlin Wall. The events are flanked by cult objects such as Pac-man el arcade tower format and the multitude of surprises, gadgets, ’Regalissimi’ included in the snacks of the Paninari generation. Or even the Ramazzotti’s amaro poster from a 1986 Mario De Biasi shot, displayed in vintage print in the exhibition, and Keith Haring ’s 1986 scenic-signal re-make for the Berlin Wall to re-enact the preparatory stages of the famous mural.

Visitors will also recognize Filippo Panseca’s Pyramid, the Biodegradable Sculptures of the previous decade, a selection of works from the artistic hotbed that was Milan’s Brown Boveri (with works by Stefano Arienti, Corrado Levi, Claudio Déstito, Pierluigi Pusole, and those of Cosimo Barna, Francesco Garbelli, Milo Sacchi among the promoters of thatinitiative), and from the specular Roman experience of theformer Pastificio Cerere juxtaposed by the large-format paintings of Nathalie Du Pasquier, Salvo, Tino Stefanoni, up to the sign maps of Alessandro Mendini and Massimo Giacon and the overpopulated pictorial subjects of Marco Cingolani.

This will be followed by iconic Milan-made design objects, including Stefano Tamburini’s covers, Giacomo (Mojetta) Spazio’s covers for Stampa Alternativa, Massimo Mattioli’s Disney parodies with Sergio Calatroni’s posters for the Afro City cycle, to Mario Convertino’s settings for Mister Fantasy and Frigidaire; the pervasive new patterns of the 1980s, characterized by the dot, the straight line, the triangle, the small repeated segment, the empty shapes scattered randomly at the margins of almost all graphic artifacts of the time: from Domus covers to Ettore Sottsass’s layouts. Then there are the LP covers and music cassette tapes designed by Mario Convertino; the comic magazines Frigidaire and Alter Alter, Lira di Dio, Satyricon, Tango, Zut and Cuore in the later variants Liver, Spleen, Mom; the proto-punk raids in the musical graphics of Giacomo Spazio and Massimo Giacon. Visual Alphabets, Re-design, Banal Design, Cosmesis, Sentimental Robot are then the titles that introduce the exuberant and vast production of the Alchimia group’s multidisciplinary project toward neo-modern design.

Present in the exhibition are the experiments made with handcrafted, salvaged materials such as: the ’Ideal Boarding House’ (Franco Raggi), the ’Sound Dress’ with the performance ’Painted People’ (Anna Gili), the ’Fashion Stylism’ (Cinzia Ruggeri) and above all, ’The Infinite Furniture’. Emotional, psychic and anthropological activities thus expand in the Refectory of the Stelline from furniture to books to didactics to video art and sound. Faces, poses, tics, and behavioral inflections finally ogle in a gallery of fifty shots by Maria Mulas documenting the glittering parties of the post-terrorist years, which anticipate the documents, memorabilia, video artifacts, newspapers, books, satirical cartoons, art catalogs, and commercial displays that complete the exhibit.

The exhibition is produced and organized by the Credito Valtellinese Group Foundation.

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Hours: Tuesday through Friday from 2 to 7 p.m.; Saturday from 9 a.m. to 12 p.m. Special opening Saturday, Feb. 23, 2019 from 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. Closed Sunday and Monday.

Free admission

Image: Bather (1982) Photo by Occhiomagico for Domus.

The 1980s, decade of special effects, told in an exhibition in Milan

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