ART-TRIBUTE: Arte Povera-A Creative Revolution

The term “Arte Povera” was introduced in 1967 by Italian art critic and curator Germano Celant to describe the work by young Italian artists who attempted to create a new sculptural language through the use of humble, everyday materials.In them, Celant found a shared revolutionary spirit inextricably linked to the increasingly radical political atmosphere in Italy at the time. By using non-precious and impermanent materials such as soil, rags, and twigs, Arte Povera artists sought to challenge and disrupt the commercialization of art.

By Efi Michalarou
Photo: The State Hermitage Museum Archive

Arte Povera’s impact on artists across Western Europe and America was both immediate and profound, and its influence is still felt around the world. The exhibition “Arte Povera: a Creative Revolution” at The State Hermitage Museum, in St, Petersburg, presents 57 works and installations that celebrate the artistic movement that has deeply influenced artists of today. The very first Arte Povera exhibition took place at the Galleria La Bertesca, Genoa, in 1967, the exhibition was staged in two sections “Arte Povera” which included the work of: Alighiero Boetti, Luciano Fabro, Jannis Kounellis, Giulio Paolini, Pino Pascali and Emilio Prini. And the section “Im Spasio” which included the work of: Umberto Bignardi, Mario Ceroli, Paolo Icaro, Renato Mambor, Eliseo Mattiacci και Cesare Tacchi. It was followed in 1968 by exhibition at the Galleria De’Foscherari in Bologna and the Arsenale in Amalfi.  Later the same year he published the manifesto “Arte Povera: Notes for a Guerilla War” in Flash Art. These and other pioneering texts and shows, plus his influential 1969 book, created a collective identity for Arte Povera, which was promoted as a revolutionary genre, liberated from convention and the market place. The artists who were to become most closely associated with the movement were concerned with that point at which art and life, nature and culture, intersect. They attempted to create a subjective understanding of matter and space allowing for an experience of the ‘primary’ energy present in all aspects of life as lived directly and not mediated through representation, ideology or codified languages. This energy was intended, on the one hand, to correspond to the basic physical forces of nature such as gravity or electricity and, on the other hand, to refer to the fundamental elements of human nature such as vitality, memory and emotion. Although Celant included numerous non-Italian artists with the movement, such as: Joseph Beuys, Carl Andre, Eva Hesse and Richard Long the core of the group featured only Italian artists. Despite growing popularity, the movement dissolved in the mid 1970s as the individual styles of the Italian artists continued to grow in different directions. Their brief unity, however, had already made its mark on the history of art, although its importance was not fully recognized until decades later. To understand better the real purpose of Arte Povera, we must also analyse the cultural context of Italy in the 1950‟s and 1960‟s. Italy was going to a period of industrialization that later became known as the “Italian miracle”.  Advanced technologies were rapidly being introduced and consumerism was finding its way into Italian society. But all the optimism for this progressive wave was then suddenly interrupted in the mid 1960‟s when an economy recession set in. Students and workers were continuously protesting not only in Italy but in all Europe and America and this brought other cultural movements and beliefs such a new sexual liberation and a hippie counter-culture. In this light, Arte Povera was no longer referring to the use of “poor‟ materials, nor to a critique of a consumer society, but to the concept of “impoverishing‟ each person’s experience of life, freeing oneself from layers of ideologies and preconceptions.

Info: Curators Christov-Bakargiev and Dimitri Ozerkov, The State Hermitage Museum, 2 Palace Square, St Petersburg, Duration 17/5-16/8/18, Days & Hours: Tue, Thu & Sat-Sun 10:30-18:00, Wed & Fri 10:30-21:00, http://hermitagemuseum.org