Horses and Horsemen. Post Scriptum

The theme ‘Horses and Horsemen’ is the subject of two interconnected exhibitions curated by Lorenzo Giusti and Alberto Salvadori. A theme declined, on the one hand, by the 20th century Italian artist who most represented it, Marino Marini, and on the other through the gaze of some contemporary artists, authors of works in which the theme of the horseman is reinterpreted in a contemporary key, according to different points of view and perspectives and which, in the project as a whole, constitute a sort of critical text in images.

From the creation of the first archetypal figures, of Etruscan memory, through a process of progressive compression of the masses, to the geometric decomposition of the figures, in the part dedicated to Marino Marini the exhibition describes a formal parabola of extraordinary intensity, in line with the most up-to-date international trends and at the same time profoundly original.

Fifteen sculptures of horses and riders are present, including an original bust of a Gentleman on Horseback from 1937 that, in the context of Marini’s production, constitutes one of the first moments of reflection on the theme. From the Marino Marini Foundation in Pistoia come the bronzes Piccolo miracolo (1955), Piccolo cavaliere (1951), Cavallo (1945) and the high relief Cavaliere (1943). The two terracotta sculptures Piccolo cavallo (Small Horse), 1943, and Cavaliere (Horseman), 1944, also have the same provenance. The bronze Cavallo dates back to 1939 and is housed in the Museo Marino Marini in Florence, from which the extraordinary Cavaliere of 1947, a Studio per miracolo of 1953-54, two Composizioni of 1956-57 and the symbolic work Due elementi, of 1971, in which the figures have by now reached a radical synthesis, also originate.

Conceived as an interconnected project to the Marino Marini exhibition, “Postscriptum” presents video works created in the last ten years by Italian and international artists: Tania Bruguera (Cuba, 1968), Alberto De Michele (Italy, 1980), Pietro Mele (Italy, 1976), Anri Sala (Albania, 1974), Carolina Saquel (Chile, 1970), Nedko Solakov (Bulgaria, 1957), Salla Tykkä (Finland, 1973). The selected works, although different from each other in terms of language, sensitivity and purpose, share a reference to the figures of the horse and the rider, subjects still capable of evoking precise suggestions and of becoming privileged interpreters of present reality.