The fruits of the earth: Trentino artists in the 19th and 20th centuries
Trento. Palazzo Roccabruna. From 20 November 2008 to 25 January 2009
With the Trento Chamber of Commerce
Curated by Maurizio Scudiero. Catalogue by esaExpoedizioni

This exhibition has been organized as part of the now traditional cultural season at Palazzo Roccabruna. It presents a survey of Trentino artists whose work has featured local produce, directly or indirectly. The show is built around a nucleus of sixty works by artists working from the late nineteenth century up to the nineteen-seventies, who have "cited" the products of the land of Trentino in their work (fruit such as apples and grapes, wine and agricultural produce). The best- known names include Fortunato Depero, Luigi Bonazza, Tullio Garbari, Bruno Colorio, Gino Pancheri, Eugenio and Romualdo Prati, Attilio Lasta, Cesarina Seppi, Roberto Baldessari and Remo Wolf. The works encompass a wide range of sizes and techniques, including painting, sculpture, drawings, graphic arts, engravings and prints, coming together to create an evocative and visually varied show. The overall impression is that of a deep attachment to the land, which for many artists becomes their main source of inspiration. Apart from the special case of the futurist Fortunato Depero - who remains ever true to his own personal style, even when, as the years go by, he substitutes his robots with characters from Trentino hostelries - the air we breathe is infused with rediscovered centuries-old values, which find fertile ground in precisely this dogged adherence to such themes. Such a rediscovery was common to the aftermath of both world wars, as art also had its "part to play" in the reconstruction of not just the material world but also of artistic sensibility and awareness.