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RE-COLLECTING. Morandi racconta. Il fascino segreto dei suoi fiori

Museo Morandi

Morandi presents. The secret charm of his flowers

Morandi racconta (Morandi presents) offers three bimonthly exhibits that focus on selected themes related to Giorgio Morandi's work. The events are interdisciplinary in nature and open to all: scholars, Morandi connoisseurs, and the simply curious. The topics have been chosen in an effort to shed new light on the maestro’s artistic production.

The first exhibit in the series, curated by Alessia Masi, is dedicated to flowers, a theme that the Bolognese artist was particularly fond of. Although Morandi’s flowers have long been considered rather minor entities, Vitale Bloch correctly remarked in 1955, that Morandi’s flowers were “true poetry for special occasions”. The works in this exhibit cover the period from 1924 to 1957, from the painting with freshly cut poppies – which is part of the museum’s own collection - to the painting with silk poppies, from a private collection. The exhibit also includes nine flower paintings that feature Morandi’s favorite silk roses.

Morandi painted the small flower bouquets as single polychromatic and multiform organic entities without dwelling on the quality of the petals as if the flower buds were truly a subject in themselves. He arranged them with extreme care, generally at the edge of the vase. The vases all had simple shapes and were generally tall and narrow. Only occasionally a vase with more complex and showy decorative elements was selected. In some compositions, the vase was hardly visible, while at other times it was full stage, the real protagonist on the scene. 

The exhibit includes two porcelain objects from Casa Morandi and remnants of the beloved, impervious to time, silk and dried flowers - that the artist preferred as his models. Finally, there are also two etchings on the subject of flowers: fresh zinnias and dried astrids along with a selection of letters and documents.

Image: Giorgio Morandi, Fiori, 1946 (V.501), oil on canvas 24,5 x 19 cm, Collection Enos and Alberto Ferri, on free loan since July 2020