The Mart in Rovereto dedicates an exhibition to the Galleria del Levante, promoter of innovative artistic trends

From March 27 to June 12, 2022, the Mart in Rovereto presents the exhibition Symbolism and New Objectivity. The Gallery of the Levant, curated by Alessandra Tiddia.

An architect by training, art critic and painter by vocation, Emilio Bertonati opened the Galleria del Levante in Milan in 1962, a meeting center for collectors, artists, critics and art lovers. A tireless scholar, he was a promoter of new artistic trends, from Symbolism to Magical Realism, from Neue Sachlichkeit to German Expressionism, to some artists contemporary to him.

the exhibition itinerary is divided into seven sections, in which are presented the exhibition projects, four or five a year, that the Gallery of the Levant realized between 1962 and 1981.

It begins with an antechamber in which there is a selection of catalogs published by the Galleria del Levante containing essays by leading critics and intellectuals, testifying to Bertonati’s deep relationships with scholars of the time. After a room devoted to the gallery owner, the exhibition continues with two rooms on Symbolism. Between dreamlike atmospheres and fantastic bestiaries, we move from a more romantic Symbolism to a more disturbing one, ending with works that herald the Futurist avant-garde. Among the artists are such well-known names as Maximilian Lenz, Gustav Klimt, Fernand Khnopff, and Max Oppenheimer.

The tour continues in the room devoted to Magic Realism and Plastic Values represented by Cagnaccio di San Pietro and Edita Broglio, respectively. By Cagnaccio, a series of still lifes are offered that represent his more analytical and severe painting, similar to the style of the German New Objectivity that the gallerist loved. The comparison develops in the section on 1930s Germany in which a disturbing atmosphere emerges, influenced by the contradictions that marked the particular historical moment.

This is followed by a section devoted to Pictorialism and photography, to which Bertonati devoted various research and publications in the 1970s. Portraits, experimental photography and photojournalism are organized in small monographic nuclei in the exhibition. The exhibition closes with an appendix on the German “new realisms” of the 1970s with the generation of young painters Bertonati became passionate about.

The exhibition also aims to highlight the Mart’s holdings, which preserve and study several of the artists selected by Bertonati. In particular, Christian Schad’s Portrait of Frieda Cornelius, Franz Radziwill’s The Cyclists, three works, two drawings and a lamp by Luciano Baldessari come from the Rovereto collections.

For info: mart.tn.it

Tickets: Full 11 euros, reduced 7 euros.

Image: Maximilian Lenz, The Spring (1904; oil on canvas; private collection).

The Mart in Rovereto dedicates an exhibition to the Galleria del Levante, promoter of innovative artistic trends

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