Enzo Cucchi in San Francisco to Open his Exhibit "Interior Costume"

Enzo Cucchi, one of the most original and visionary artists of our time, transforms the Istituto Italiano di Cultura’s (Italian Cultural Institute) gallery into his symbolic vision of the universe for his exhibition Interior Costume.

The exhibition premiered in the States at the Italian Cultural Institute of Los Angeles before its next stop at the Italian Cultural Institute of San Francisco. Interior Costume was inaugurated at the Capodimonte Museum in Naples in the summer of 2009 and shown at MACRO, the Museum of Contemporary Art in Rome earlier this year.

The artist will be present in his only US appearance for a special opening of the exhibit at the Istituto Italiano di Cultura of San Francisco, on Thursday, June 24 at 6:30 pm. Glen Helfand, art critic and educator, will introduce Enzo Cucchi. “It is a great honor for the Istituto to present this unique installation” commented Amelia Carpenito Antonucci, Director of the IIC “especially since Enzo Cucchi will be at the gallery for the opening night”.

Emerging from the fundamental link between the language of Cucchi's contemporary artworks and the world of theatre (which transforms the attire of performance into "costume"), Interior Costume turns into an intimate and interior "other" place, and takes the visitor on a visionary journey to the very origins of the image and of the senses. Inside the gallery, the world-renowned Italian artist’s large anthropomorphic presences and hanging figures (heads, skulls, agglomerations of paint, and thin spheres) reverberate in an emotional and visual counter- point and create an "inner costume."

“There is no painting without a drawing” replied Enzo Cucchi during a recent interview for La Stampa, one of Italy’s leading daily papers. When renowned novelist and journalist Alain Elkann asked the artist the reason why he draws and the motive for this exhibition, Cucchi said “…If you paint a painting without a drawing you become a window dresser”. He continued “I don’t draw to tell a story, that is the writers’ and the illustrators’ job. The drawing is the idea of a day”.

The exhibition is curated by Achille Bonito Oliva and is accompanied by a limited edition, bilingual catalog designed by the artist and published by Associazione Incontri Internazionali d’Arte, directed by Graziella Lonardi Buontempo, with a preface by Nicola Spinosa, Supervisor of the Naples Museum Hub. Interior Costume is organized by the Italian Cultural Institute of San Francisco in collaboration with the Italian Cultural Institute of Los Angeles.

Special thanks to Alitalia, Associazione Incontri Internazionali d’Arte, and Villa Florence Hotel. The exhibition is free and open to the public June 24 – July 31, 2010. Opening night with the artist: Thursday, June 24 at 6:30 pm.

Italian Cultural Institute of San Francisco: 425 Washington Street (at Battery St), Suite 200 San Francisco, CA 94111 Tel. (415) 788-7142 Email: contact.sanfrancisco@esteri.it www.sfiic.org

Enzo Cucchi (Morro d’Alba, Ancona, 1949) is a prominent Italian artist who together with Sandro Chia, Francesco Clemente, Nicola De Maria and Mimmo Paladino, has been one of the main representatives of Transavanguardia, the Italian Neo-Expressionist art movement defined by critic Achille Bonito Oliva. Cucchi has always pursued his unique and complex symbolic language, which is interlaced with cultured quotations and lyrical intensity. In his works he combines different forms of art, continuously moving from the likes of drawing, painting and literature. Cucchi has also been active in the field of stage design.

He has designed costumes and sets for productions such as Rossini’s and Respighi’s “La Bottega Fantastica” at the Rossini Opera Festival in Pesaro and Heinrich von Kleist’s “Penthesilea,” both in 1986; Puccini’s “Tosca” at the Teatro dell’Opera in Rome (1990- 1991); Pennisi’s “Funeral of the Moon” in Gibellina (1991) and an adaptation of Erasmus’ “In Praise of Folly” (1992). In 1996 he designed the curtain for the Teatro la Fenice in Senigallia.

Cucchi was invited to the Venice Biennale (1980 and 1993); Documenta in Kassel (1982 and 1987); Quadriennale in Rome (1991 and 2005); and to the International Biennale in San Paolo (1985 and in 1996). His work has been presented in the most important museums all over the world, including Kunsthaus in Zurich (1982 and 1988); Kunsthalle in Basil (1984); ICA in Boston (1984); Kunstmuseum in Düsseldorf and Louisiana Museum in Humlebaek (1985); Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York and Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris (1986); Wiener Secession in Vienna (1988); Museo Luigi Pecci in Prato (1989); Galleria Nazionale d’Arte Moderna in Rome (1998); Tel Aviv Museum Enzo Cucchi of Art (2001); EMMA in Espoon Kaupunki, Finland (2009); Museo Correr in Venice (2007); and MACRO in Rome (2010). Enzo Cucchi lives and works in Rome and Ancona.

Glen Helfand is a freelance writer, critic, curator and teacher. His writing on art, culture, design and technology, often concentrating on works by Bay Area artists, has appeared in Artforum, Art on Paper, Salon, SFGate, Wired, San Francisco Bay Guardian, and many other publications. He is a co-founder of the Bay Area-based arts website, stretcher.org and has curated exhibitions for the M.H. de Young Museum in San Francisco, the San Jose Museum of Art and numerous alternative and commercial gallery spaces. He has taught lecture and seminar courses on contemporary art at San Francisco Art Institute, San Francisco State University, California College of the Arts, and Mills College. He was a 2003 Artist-in-Residence at the Headlands Center for the Arts in Marin.

Incontri Internazionali d'Arte

Based in Rome, Incontri Internazionali d'Arte, was founded in 1970 as an apolitical, non- profit association which aims to spread and increase awareness of contemporary art in all its forms, focusing in particular on new developments. The Secretary General is Graziella Lonardi Buontempo, who has held the position since the founding of the association. Alberto Moravia has been President since 1975.