Emilio Isgrò

Artist of the Year 2024

As part of the “Artista alla GNAMC” (Artist at GNAMC) programme, the Galleria Nazionale d’Arte Moderna e Contemporanea selected Emilio Isgrò as its Artist of the Year 2024. Promoted and organised by director Renata Cristina Mazzantini, the initiative draws inspiration from the visiting artist programmes of major international institutions and adopts the formula “one year, one artist, one room”, dedicating a focused exhibition space and a programme of events for the public, scholars and students to a leading figure in contemporary Italian art. Within this framework, the room devoted to Emilio Isgrò presents the most recent developments in his exploration of Cancellatura (Erasure), through works such as Planetarium (2023) and Isgrò cancella Isgrò (Isgrò Erases Isgrò, 2024), alongside works already held in the museum’s collection. For the Artista alla GNAMC programme, Isgrò also created the site-specific work Isgrò cancella Isgrò, conceived especially for the museum’s spaces and donated to the Galleria.

The Exhibition

The room dedicated to Emilio Isgrò presents the most recent developments in the evolution of Cancellatura (Erasure), bringing Planetarium (2023) and Isgrò cancella Isgrò (Isgrò Erases Isgrò, 2024) into dialogue with works already held in the Galleria’s collection, including Storico (Historical, 1972) and Le Tavole della Legge ovvero la Bibbia di Vetro (The Tablets of the Law, or the Glass Bible, 1994). The book, a central element in the artist’s practice, appears here as an object to be displayed and transformed, ultimately becoming sculpture and a fragile embodiment of the word. In Planetarium, suspended globes with their place names erased evoke the complexity of contemporary globalisation and suggest new ways of reading the world. Isgrò cancella Isgrò, by contrast, reflects on identity and its negation, confirming the artist’s enduring ability to reinvent his own visual language. Taken together, the works span more than sixty years of research, revealing how Cancellatura has become one of the most distinctive and radical expressions of contemporary Italian art.

Gallery

The project was accompanied by a programme of talks, lectures and in-depth activities exploring the key themes of Isgrò’s research, offering the public the tools to engage with the complexity of an artistic career spanning more than sixty years of Italian art history.

Exhibition Opening

The artist

Emilio Isgrò was born in Barcellona Pozzo di Gotto in 1937. A poet, writer and artist, he is one of the most influential figures in contemporary Italian and international art. From the 1960s onwards, he developed the practice of erasure, which became the defining feature of his artistic research. Through it, he transforms books, encyclopaedias, maps and documents into works that reflect on the relationship between language, memory, knowledge and power. His practice encompasses installations, paintings, sculptures, environmental interventions and works of visual poetry, in a body of work that brings the visual arts and literature into dialogue. He has participated in the Venice Biennale on several occasions, and his works have been presented in major museums and exhibition venues in Italy and abroad, including MAXXI in Rome, Palazzo Reale in Milan, Gallerie d’Italia and the Centre Pompidou in Paris. Throughout his career, he has received numerous awards and distinctions and is regarded as one of the leading figures of Italian Conceptual Art, capable of redefining the value of both the poetic word and the image through a language of extraordinary expressive power.

The Artista alla GNAMC initiative is supported by GNAMC’s institutional sponsors: Autostrade per l’Italia, Banca Ifis, Enel, Fondazione Roma, Gruppo Ferrovie dello Stato Italiane, Intesa Sanpaolo, Maire and Webuild. Their support has made the project possible.