The exhibition Oltre le ceneri (Beyond the Ashes) by Renzogallo, curated by Aldo Iori and conceived specifically for the spaces of the Mattatoio, takes shape as a path designed in close relation to the exhibition venue. The exhibition project unfolds as a conceptual and poetic journey through the artist’s research, beginning with the site-specific work created for the occasion: a sequence of red iron elements which, arranged within the space as a single organism, give form to a large unified installation.
The exhibition continues with an installation made of wood and red-painted newspapers, paintings on canvas and mixed-media works on paper, all of which participate in the concept of threshold and passage, within a widespread dialogue between materials and dimensions.
At the heart of the artist’s work lies an urgency: to move beyond pre-packaged forms of narration, to call dominant narratives into question — particularly those of the mass media — and to seek horizons of meaning where there appear to be only ruins.
The environmental installations are always presented on a scale adapted to the exhibition space that hosts them, while pursuing a personal idea of monumentality. The works become visionary architecture, a proposal for the transformation of space that does not impose itself on the place in which it is located, but enters into dialogue with it. Each structure is conceived to activate, through the presence of the viewer, an active relationship between body, space and vision.
The role of the observer, central to the completion of every work, becomes the protagonist of the exhibition conceived for the Mattatoio, through a physical, sensory and emotional interaction that becomes aware of reality in its complexity and multiplicity.
Oltre le ceneri (Beyond the Ashes) is an invitation to question space as it moves through time, understood as a further category and spatial continuum, capable of transforming places into surfaces of passage, into crossings of meanings, forms and relationships. Through the evocative and symbolic force of red, moreover, the exhibition project becomes a dream of potency, a sign and sense of vital warmth that takes on volume and intensity: a lively and restless purity.
Renzogallo (Lorenzo Gallo, Rome, 1943)
Renzogallo received his early artistic training in Rome at the Liceo Artistico di via Ripetta, under the guidance of Giuseppe Capogrossi, Giulio Turcato, Afro and Gastone Novelli. In 1964 he won a scholarship competition to Madrid, where he held his first solo exhibition, before moving to Barcelona and, the following year, to Paris. His first solo exhibition in Italy, introduced by Gastone Novelli, was held at the historic Roman gallery Il Ferro di Cavallo in 1967.
During these years, his interests expanded towards the study of architecture and participation in experiences connected with avant-garde theatre. In the 1970s he devoted greater attention to painting, to its conception and to the definition of space understood as a multidimensional state of art. His work is characterised by the adoption of a minimal square-grid structure, onto which he places sign-based variations, subtle modulations of colour and various material insertions that extend from the surface of the work into the surrounding exhibition space.
In 1976 he created his first large installation at the Galleria Civica di Modena, followed the next year by another at Palazzo dei Diamanti in Ferrara. In 1985 he adopted the artist name Renzogallo. During the 1980s and 1990s, his works were further enriched by heterogeneous elements, such as wire mesh, clay, wood, glass and various kinds of paper, which took on an increasingly three-dimensional quality, leading to installations with distinctly environmental characteristics. His works have been acquired by Italian and international museums.
In the 2000s, after concluding his teaching experience in art high schools, he began teaching at Sapienza University of Rome and at the Academy of Fine Arts of Perugia, and collaborated with the University of Tuscia. He has produced numerous public works in Italy and abroad and has held solo exhibitions in many private galleries, including Il Collezionista in Rome, Cesare Manzo in Pescara, Fabjbasaglia in Bologna, La Polena in Genoa, Arco di Rab in Rome, Epikentro in Patras and Athens, and Polhammer Gallery in Steyr, Austria.
Particularly significant were the double solo exhibition with his friend Hidetoshi Nagasawa at Fondazione Volume in Rome in 2000, and his solo exhibition at the Maria Grazia del Prete Gallery in Rome in 2009, where he presented new series of three-dimensional works. Other solo and group exhibitions have been held not only in Italy, but also in Sweden, Greece, Japan, France, Korea, Finland, Russia, Spain, Austria, the United States and China.
Among the group exhibitions, mention should be made of: the XI Quadriennale di Roma in 1986, the XXII Premio Termoli, the IV Biennale di Grafica di Trento, the XXXI Biennale di Milano, Borderline at the Museo Convento dei Serviti di Maria in Monteciccardo, Pesaro and Urbino; Borderland in San Piero a Sieve, Florence; the Musée du Château d’Annecy, France; Lineainfinita at Villa Domenica, Treviso; Premio Marsala; the GAZI Museum in Athens; MACRO Lavori in corso 8 in Rome; the 1999 Venice Biennale — Collateral Events; and Arte Architetture Città in Rome.
In recent years, he has received commissions for sculptures placed in public spaces. His environmental works have been created in Villa Santa Maria, Chieti; at the Lake Pirkkala Park, Finland; at the MAAAPO Museum in Arena Po, Pavia; at the MIDA Museum in Pertosa, Salerno; along the Via Francigena in San Lorenzo Nuovo, Viterbo, where he created five works; at Parco POLGAI in Pescara; at Poggio Aquilone in San Venanzo, Perugia; at the Ktima Gerovassiliou Sculpture Collection Park in Thessaloniki, Greece; at the University of Tuscia, Viterbo; and at Sculture in Campo Sculpture Park in Bassano in Teverina, Viterbo.
He has taken part as a speaker in numerous conferences and seminars on his work and on Environmental Art. He lives and works in Rome.
www.renzogallo.it