The project, financed by “PAC 2020”, concerns the purchase of the work Waterbones by Loris Cecchini
Good news for Palazzo Collicola and the collection at the Spoleto Modern Art Gallery.
Following its participation in the “PAC 2020” call for proposals promoted by the Ministry of Culture’s General Directorate for Contemporary Creativity to acquire and enhance new works for the permanent collections of Italian museums, Palazzo Collicola came sixth out of 66 participating institutions in the list of 12 museums eligible for funding (including Madre in Naples, Museion in Bolzano, GNAM in Rome and GAMEC in Bergamo).
The project concerns in particular the purchase of the work Waterbones by Loris Cecchini, created specifically for the external base of Palazzo Collicola on the occasion of the solo exhibition of the artist inaugurated in 2019 precisely at the opening of the new course of the museum. The work had been granted by the artist on loan.
The polished steel sculpture, resembling an organic and vegetable form, particularly suitable and resistant for outdoor spaces, made up of almost one hundred modules screwed and welded together, represents the very evolution of the concept of modern and contemporary sculpture, a particular history of which the museum’s collection and the history of Spoleto itself bear numerous prestigious presences, such as Calder, Pascali, Ceroli, Franchina, Pepper, Leoncillo and LeWitt.
The work of art will thus enrich the courtyard of Palazzo Collicola, becoming part of an ideal sculpture garden that today sees the presence, in addition to Cecchini’s work, of those by Richard Serra, Isamu Noguchi and the recent donation by Paolo Canevari, while on the external base it is possible to admire the monumental sculpture specially created by the artist Eduard Habicher: Libera mente.
It is an important recognition by the Ministry of Culture, which places Palazzo Collicola, despite its limited resources, among the most authoritative museums of modern and contemporary Italian art. In fact, with this ministerial call for bids, Palazzo Collicola has now won three bids between 2019 and 2021, after the one from the National Committee for the Centenary of Giovanni Carandente and the Exhibit programme obtained on the occasion of Canevari’s solo exhibition.
The project was curated by Marco Tonelli, director of Palazzo Collicola, and Lorenzo Fiorucci (head of the museum’s special projects) and followed in its technical-administrative phases by Antonella Proietti (Culture Office of the City of Spoleto).
Loris Cecchini (1969) is an artist who enjoys wide international recognition. We need only recall his solo exhibitions in prestigious museums, including the Palais de Tokio in Paris, the Musée d’Art Moderne in Saint-Etienne Métropole, MoMA PS1 in New York, the Shanghai Duolun MoMA in Shanghai, the Centro Gallego de Arte Contemporanea in Santiago de Compostela, the Kunstverein in Heidelberg, the Centro per l’Arte Contemporanea Luigi Pecci in Prato, and the Fondazione Arnaldo Pomodoro in Milan. Not to mention his participation in the Venice Biennale, the Shanghai Biennale, the Taiwan Biennale in Taipei, the Valencia Biennale in Spain, the International Sculpture Biennale in Carrara.
He has created numerous permanent and site-specific installations, in particular at Villa Celle in Pistoia and in the courtyard of Palazzo Strozzi in Florence, at the Boghossian Foundation in Brussels and for the Cleveland Clinic’s Arts & Medicine Institute in the United States, at Les Terrasses Du Port in Marseille, at the Shinsegae Hanam Starfield in Seoul, in the Lazzerini Library in Prato, in the Cornell Tech, Tata building in New York and on a public building in Beijing in China.
