By Giorgio Di Marzo
We have met Dr. Rossana Pittelli, Art Expert at the Italian Cultural Institute in London, to talk about her work and the objectives of the Institute.
Clearly the first question is the one that we normally ask to all the people involved in the art sector, which is “What is art?”. For Dr. Pittelli art is an expression of refined awareness and skills, the virtuosity and geniality that only few people have to communicate their ideas through different forms of expression.
If we consider, instead, the art of a country, this represents its past, its present and its future, especially nowadays that the distance among countries is increasingly reduced through the widespread use of media technology. To this purpose, for Dr. Pittelli, is important to underline how this reduction might allow us Italians to present ourselves better and easier in a foreign country: for example, we are now present in China with a number of artists and one of these artists, Alessandro Kokocinski, whose art work is on display at the Beijing Museum, will be presenting his exhibition from the 7th of December at the Italian Culture Institute, in collaboration with the Spectrum Gallery.
The beauty of London – continues Dr. Pittelli – is that at the moment it is really the capital of all arts, since here it is possible to find everything people look for and this is especially pleasurable for people like her who have pursued a career in the arts. Rossana Pittelli has in fact taught History of Arts at the Academy of Arts and knows how the history of art is a continuum starting from the origins of human kind and arriving to the present day.
Rossana Pittelli is the curator of The Colours of Italy, at the moment at the ICI, where we find works of Italian contemporary artists that go against the current trends pursued by some English artists like the Chapman brothers or Damian Hirst; however, artists like Benaglia, Fortunato and Sagliola, just to mention some of the Italian artists present in the exhibition, are still very appreciated in the UK.
Another exhibition that would be hosted shortly, which will involve as curators Rossana Pittelli and Sir Denis Mahon – the greatest expert of Sixteenth century Italian art and in particular of Guercino – will be “Diacromie”. The exhibition will present 15 works by Massimo Pulini – painter, teacher of History of Arts and art curator – together with 5 works from the late Sixteenth century art from the Koelliker collection. These works will be: La Maddalena by Ficherelli, Galatea by Cantofoli, San Pietro by Guercino, La Venere by Andrea Sacchi and a self portrait attributed to Bernini. For some time the Italian Cultural Institute will be thus turned into an art gallery.
Promoting Italian artists is one of the main objectives of the Institute which is directed by Dr. Pierluigi Barrotta, and it is always a surprising pleasure learning that Italian culture and art are very appreciated in London. The Italian Culture Institute represents in this context a point of attraction for Italy lovers, as it has shown the great success of the presentation of the exhibition “Canaletto in England” organised by the Dulwich Picture Gallery at the ICI. The ICI has also collaborated to the organisation of the Leonardo da Vinci exhibition now on display at the Victoria & Albert Museum.
Dr. Pittelli also likes to specify that the promotional activity of the Institute does not only concern visual arts, but also music, cinema, theatre, conferences, literature and all that regards Italian culture. It is thus important to highlight the great participation and success that these events obtain not only from the Italian and English public, but also from other nationalities. Since we share with the Institute the objective of promoting young Italian artists in London, we will definitely be involved in collaborating with the Institute.
We thus wish good luck to Dr. Rossana Pittelli, to Dr. Pierluigi Barrotta and to all those who work and collaborate with the Italian Cultural Institute towards the promotion of Italian art and artists and to keep high the image of our country.
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