The evolution of motherhood as
portrayed by artists in the 20th century stars at Milan's
Palazzo Reale in one of this fall's most highly anticipated
exhibits.
La Grande Madre (The Great Mother) opened this week through
November 26.
It showcases 400 artworks by 139 of the most celebrated
artists of the 1900s, offering the public a sweeping look at
the artistic evolution of the mother figure from the avant-garde
movements until the present day.
The show is set to coincide with the end of the food-themed
Universal Exposition running in Milan until October 31, and is
one of the Expo in the City 2015 events organized in Italy's
financial capital.
The exhibit delves into nurturing, nourishment, and
nutrition - issues that are central to both motherhood and the
Expo world's fair, whose motto is Feeding the Planet, Energy for
Life.
It examines the archetype of motherhood - a stereotype
strongly connected with Italy - to explore the historic,
political and social aspects of the role.
Organized in close cooperation with Beatrice Trussardi,
the exhibit focuses first on the relationship between women and
power over a key century for emancipation, mingling contemporary
art with history by putting today's artworks alongside
masterpieces from the past.
La Grande Madre opens with a presentation of the collection
of Olga Froebe-Kapteyn, with its thousands of images
representing motherhood, including prehistoric goddesses.
The show also focuses on the participation of women in
avant-garde movements - Futurism, Dadaism and Surrealism - to
highlight the transformation of gender roles at the beginning of
the 20th century.
The second part of the show highlights the evolution of
Surrealism into an individual mythology whose symbolic strength
also draws inspiration from archaic cultures as portrayed by
Louise Bourgeois.
In the 1960s and 1970s, women artists such as Mary Kelly
and Yoko Ono created a new visual vocabulary to stress the
centrality of the female body and question ideal notions of the
hearth - traditionally a woman's territory - as a space that can
also be one of tension and abuse.
The exhibit also includes Camille Hernot's award-winning
video Grosse Fatigue (Big Labor), which explores myths of
creation and the birth of Mother Earth.
Curator Massimiliano Gioni - artistic director of the
Trussardi Foundation and the New Museum in New York - also
selected work by artists such as Carla Accardi, Umberto
Boccioni, Maurizio Cattelan, Salvador Dalì, Marcel Duchamp, Max
Ernst, Lucio Fontana, Frida Kahlo, Jeff Koons, and Edward Munch.
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