Workplace at GRANPALAZZO, Palazzo Rospigliosi, Zagarolo, Rome
Eric Bainbridge The Philosophers Garden, 2011 Steel 197 x 197 x 154 cm 77 1/2 x 77 1/2 x 60 5/8 in (EB0396)
Installation view: Eric Bainbridge Steel Sculptures, Camden Art Centre, London. 2012
Photo: Andy Keate
Courtesy of the artist and Workplace Gallery
Workplace Gallery is proud to be participating in the inaugural presentation of Granpalazzo where we will be exhibiting 3 recent works by Eric Bainbridge
Eric Bainbridge was born in Consett, County Durham, UK in 1955. He completed a Masters in Sculpture at the Royal College of Art, London in 1981. Bainbridge has exhibited in important group exhibitions throughout his career such as Material Culture at the Hayward Gallery, London, British Art of the 80's and 90's at IMMA in Dublin, and recently in Modern British Sculpture at the Royal Academy, London. Solo exhibitions include View Points The Walker Art Centre, Minneapolis, Eric Bainbridge at The ICA Boston, Style, Space, Elegance at The Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam, Forward Thinking at MIMA, Middlesbrough, and Steel Sculptures at Camden Art Centre. Bainbridge's work is in significant international collections including the Stedelijk Collection, Arts Council England Collection, The Margulies Collection, and the Tate Collection. Bainbridge lives and works in Sunderland, Hartlepool and London.
Hugo Canoilas also a Workplace artist, will be exhibiting at Granpalazzo courtesy of Colicaligreggi, Italy. For more information on the works that we are exhibiting please contact: miles@workplacegallery.co.uk
Giorgio Andreotta Calò - Zero... | Eric Bainbridge - Workplace | Riccardo Baruzzi - P420 | Vanessa Billy - BolteLang | Ernesto Burgos - The Goma | Hugo Canoilas - Colicaligreggi | Maxim Liulca - Spazio A | Maria Loboda - Maisterravalbuena | Mohamed Namou - mor charpentier | Nick Oberthaler - Martin van Zomeren | Damir Očko - Tiziana Di Caro | Amalia Pica - Stigter van Doesburg | Benedetto Pietromarchi - Josh Lilley | Sasha Pohle - Weingrüll | Wilfredo Prieto - NoguerasBlanchard | Mateusz Sadowski - Stereo | Samara Scott - Ermes | Margo Wolowiec - Anat Ebgi
The exceptional fifteenth-century venue of Palazzo Rospigliosi in Zagarolo, in the Roman countryside, will be the setting of GRANPALAZZO, an exhibition event, and an intense contemporary art weekend taking place on May 30th and 31st. Conceived by Paola Capata, Delfo Durante, Ilaria Gianni and Federica Schiavo, for its first edition, GRANPALAZZO, presents the works of 18 artists supported by 18 of the most dynamic and interesting galleries coming from the Italian and International art scene, a performance programme curated by Ilaria Gianni, and a series of special projects. As a first attempt of an event developed outside the usual contemporary art appointments, GRANPALAZZO will take place in an intimate and relaxing dimension, which aims to encourage an authentic dialogue between artists, the audience and art professionals. The goal of the organizing team is to emphasize the quality of the artistic discourse in the contemporary sphere by focusing on a small amount of artists and their related galleries, whose practices stand out in terms of high-level curatorship, effective scouting and the creation of an independent market. Coming from Italy, Algeria, Argentina, Croatia, Cuba, Germany, Great Britain, Moldavia, Poland, Portugal, the U.S., and Switzerland, the artists will show their works - some of which have been specifically produced and others re-though in their display - in a narrative path articulated throughout the beautiful rooms of Palazzo Rospigliosi, suggesting a dialogue between different poetics, styles, and artistic approaches. "For the first edition of GRANPALAZZO, we chose among some of the most interesting, serious, and consistent artists in the contemporary art scene" says Ilaria Gianni. "The challenge of the project", she goes on, "is to create a bridge between epochs: a respectful, reciprocal relationship between the art of the past, represented by the aristocratic Palazzo Rospigliosi, with its architecture, its frescoed decorations illustrating the history of the families that have inhabited it - and consequently narrating a portion of Italy's artistic and political history - and the interpretation of the present through the contemporary. In order to create an innovative, pertinent dialogue with the complex program of the Palazzo, the artists have been invited to interact with the site, and to explore the artistic repertoire of the country by presenting ambitious and specifically conceived installations for its the rooms. In this way, forms, points of view, visual interpretations of the present will coexist with a tangible history, developing a dimension which calls into question the viewer and his space-and-time perception".
Built during the 16th century by the Colonna family - protagonist of the Renaissance and Baroque in Rome - and after purchased by the Rospigliosi Pallavicini family, the building houses wonderful unique works, including frescoes and grotesques in an excellent state of preservation. Beside the exhibition the building will host a series of performances and special projects specifically developed for the occasion.
THE PERFORMANCES The performance programme will involve some of the artists included in the exhibition. The Cuban artist Wilfredo Prieto will present The Battle of Shadows, a lyrical reading of a boxing match, experienced through the vision of the deformed shadows of its protagonist. In Braccio di Lettura, Riccardo Baruzzi will reveal the sound-qualities of sculpture, creating a polyrhythmic composition with musical instruments realized by himself. Wearing the shoes of his alter-ego "Jeffrey", a sixty-years-old hippy, Hugo Canolias in Sinhô Elias meditates on the multitude of the self, performing a monologue between the prophetic and the poetic, between the magical and the critical. Drawing from the experience of the "Bread and Puppet Theatre", meditating on a rehabilitation of the concept of 'direct work', and on the collective neutralization of the responsibility of the single, Tomaso De Luca presents Declaration of Independence from the Tyranny of Consciousness, a parade of large painted figures connecting GRANPALAZZO's venue with Zagarolo's Farmers Market. Tomaso De Luca's project is realized with support of OnFair.
THE SPECIAL PROJECTS The contemporary cultural agency and publishing house NERO, in collaboration with Max Renkel - artist - and Giuseppe Garrera - art collector and art history professor - presents Roma 2000-2015, an exhibition project celebrating the city through the invites of the most representative exhibitions that took place in Rome during the past fifteen years. A so-called 'exhibition of exhibitions' following a trace that is, in most cases per se, a piece of art. The curatorial and editorial platform CURA presents an installation by the artist Paolo Canevari. Investigating the most intimate aspects of a person in relation to an artwork, Canevari will work on the idea of knowledge, its transmission and its communication, focusing on the concept of identity. Lulu, lively art platform from Mexico City, will present a series of video by the French-Italian artists Marie Cool and Fabio Balducci. Based in Barcelona, the non-profit art space The Green Parrot presents On n'a rien pour, a performance by Oriol Vilanova about the tricks and shrewdness of the picaresque anti-hero. In flea markets, as in art-fairs, the buyers seek to get the best price, whereas the sellers, on their regard, the highest profit. The result is: failure. Waiting for the first edition of GRANPALAZZO the backstage of the project can be followed on ATP Diary, official partner of GRANPALAZZO 2015. From May the web platform will offer anticipations, insights on the works, on the participating artists, on the curated programmes and on the project spaces involved in the event. Artsy, the leading resource for learning about and collecting art, is the Exclusive Online Partner of GRANPALAZZO. The GRANPALAZZO preview will be online starting on May 29th. Artsy provides free access via its website (Artsy.net) and iPhone app to 250,000 images of art and architecture by 40,000 artists, comprising the world's largest online database of contemporary art. Powered by The Art Genome Project, a classification system that maps the connections between artists and artworks, Artsy fosters new generations of art lovers, museum-goers, patrons, and collectors, including those who might not be able to make it to Italy.
GRANPALAZZO 2015 is realized in collaboration with the prestigious Institution of Palazzo Rospigliosi in Zagarolo.
Workplace Gallery is a contemporary art gallery run by artists.
Based in Gateshead UK, Workplace Gallery represents a portfolio of emerging and established artists through the gallery programme, curatorial projects and international art fairs.