The owner, director and curator of Rome's Galleria Il Segno will be remembered by the art historian Ester Coen, by her daughters Enrica and Francesca Antonini and through testimonials from her artist, critic, art historian and writer friends read by actors Mily Cultrera and Filippo Tirabassi, to the accompaniment of musical improvisation from Luca Chiaraluce.
The testimonials recalling Angelica Savinio are from Giuseppe Appella, Margherita Belardetti, Silvia Bignardi Angelotti, Umberto Bignardi, Gregorio Botta, Emanuela Canali, Silvia Carandini, Nicoletta Cardano, Giorgio Chierici, Giovanna De Feo, Massimo Di Carlo, Alessandra Giovannoni, Luisa Laureati Briganti, Gloria Manghetti, Maurizio Pierfranceschi Ludovico Pratesi, Marina Premoli, Ruggero Savinio, Nicola Selva Bonino, Alessandro Tinterri, Nina Tirabassi and Lorenza Trucchi.
The Tribute, produced in conjunction with the gallery owner's heirs, is part of a research project entitled "Mostre a Roma 1970-1989" (exhibitions in Rome 1970-1989)" in the context of a programme that the Palazzo delle Esposizioni is developing in keeping with its function as Contemporary Art and Culture Cluster with the aim of boosting familiarity with, and awareness of, Rome's exhibition activity.
The figure of Angelica Savinio, who passed away in 2020 at the age of ninety-two, needs no introduction. The renown and esteem surrounding her are not due to her being the daughter of Alberto Savinio or the niece of Giorgio de Chirico so much as to the activity of the Galleria Il Segno, which she managed with creative flair for fifty years. Situated in Rome's Via Capolecase only steps away from Trinità de’ Monti, the gallery, founded in 1957 by Carla Panicali and Bruno Herlitzka, was taken over in 1964 by Angelica Savinio who kept its clear, meaningful name with its attractive grainy graphics and its specialisation, focusing over the years chiefly, although by no means exclusively, on works of art on the delicate support of paper. She started with an exhibition of drawings and tempera works by Piero Dorazio, and for many years she tirelessly cultivated a group of artists who were to become her friends and who were prepared to acknowledge graphic art's expressive power: Achille Perilli, Toti Scialoja, Gastone Novelli, Giuseppe Capogrossi, Alberto Burri, Guido Strazza, Ruggero Savinio, Giulio Turcato, Fausto Melotti, Osvaldo Licini, Tancredi and Giulia Napoleone. Those who knew Angelica Savinio recall her strong cultural background, of which she never boasted but which shone through as the solid base on which she built such outstanding events as her exhibitions of work by Jean Dubuffet (1967), Hans Richter (1969 and 1970), Pierre Klossowski (1969), Hans Bellmer (1970 and 1975), Max Ernst (1972), Hans Arp (1972) and Le Corbusier (1976). Favouring the commendable practice of cooperation, she worked in conjunction with the Istituto Austriaco di Cultura and the Goethe Institut between 1975 and 1979 to devise exhibitions with an original – one might almost say cutting – edge that were very much involved in the then fiery debate over the primacy of drawing and the practice of citation: "Nuova pittuta in Austria 1923" with work by Gustav Klimt and Oskar Kokoschka among others, and "Aspetti del Simbolismo" and "The Nazarenes and Their Era", the latter two curated in collaboration with Mario Quesada. And last but not least, Angelica Savinio proved capable of constantly grasping and conveying with her uniquely perceptive flair the vitality of the new generations who ended up at Il Segno in successive waves, with exhibitions of work by Sylvano Bussotti, Claudio Cintoli, Enzo Cucchi (the author of a prodigious exhibition devoted to the so-called Palazzo "dei Pupazzi" in which the gallery is situated), Alessandra Giovannoni, Andrea Aquilanti, Maurizio Pierfranceschi, Gregorio Botta and many more. The youngest of these were suggested to her by her daughter Francesca to whom she eventually entrusted the gallery in 2014, on which occasion it was renamed Francesca Antonini Arte Contemporanea.
As the gallery owner herself admitted, Il Segno was never a trendsetting gallery, but what it certainly did not lack was consistency in the unflagging development of a cultural agenda over many years that enriched the city of Rome with a venue within everyone's reach where people could seize the very fragrance of art in all its beauty.
Images:
Exhibition “American Supermarket”, Galleria Il Segno, Roma March 1965, Photo Alfio di Bella - Archivio Galleria Il Segno, Roma.
Angelica Savinio at the exhibition “American Supermarket”, Galleria Il Segno, Roma March 1965, Photo Alfio di Bella - Archivio Galleria Il Segno, Roma.
Franco Angeli and Angelica Savinio at Giulio Turcato's exhibition, Galleria Il Segno, Roma October 1965, Photo Archivio Galleria Il Segno, Roma.
Angelica Savinio at Alberto Burri's exhibition, Galleria Il Segno, Roma December 1965, Photo Alfio di Bella - Archivio Galleria Il Segno, Roma.
Informazioni
Free admission with mandatory reservation. Reservations can be made on line up to 30 minutes before the event, on www.palazzoesposizioni.it. If you can't make it, please remember to cancel your reservation in your allocated area on the website so as to allow others to attend in your place. You should arrive 10 minutes before the encounter starts, otherwise your reservation will be invalid and your place will be given to the first person in the queue at the door. Please arrive in good time to comply with the measures designed to contain the spread of COVID-19. Remember to wear your mask at the door and throughout the encounter
Auditorium
Staircase in via Milano 9 a, Roma