Giorgio Celiberti. From the 1948 Venice Biennale to the Present

Curated by Alessio Alessandrini

The Galleria Nazionale d’Arte Moderna e Contemporanea presents From the 1948 Venice Biennale to the Present, a temporary exhibition featuring a selection of works by the distinguished Friulian master Giorgio Celiberti, offering an insight into the profound meaning of his art. The exhibition provides an opportunity to explore the artist’s research through works including 900 (1998, acrylic on canvas) and Diario di bordo (1997, acrylic on canvas), which testify to the continuity of his artistic journey and serve as witnesses to, and vehicles for, the memory of a century—the twentieth century—and of the emotions and experiences that shaped it. To understand their meaning in its most intimate dimension, it is necessary to know the artist not only through evidence of his talent, but also as a man, with his experiences and humanity: a creatively independent personality who was at the same time generous, sociable and entirely free of any elitist attitude. Celiberti does not belong to any clearly defined artistic school or movement; rather, his research develops from an inner necessity rather than from adherence to aesthetic programmes.

In the 1960s, the artist embarked on a new and personal path, abandoning the language through which he had previously expressed himself, which can be associated with Expressionism.

This turning point is often linked to his encounter with the memory of the Holocaust and with the city of Terezín, an experience that deepened his profound compassion for violated innocence and also found expression in commemorative works. This transformation appears to have arisen from a profound need for inner recognition and artistic autonomy, almost as a necessary transition towards a more universal dimension of his language. Celiberti’s very presence evokes something archaic and primordial: in his face and gestures, one senses an almost ritual dimension, reminiscent of the shaman, the priest or the ancient maker of images. This dimension is also reflected in his art, which seems to establish an ideal connection with the artists of the prehistoric caves of Lascaux and Altamira, where painting served not only an aesthetic purpose but also a magical and symbolic one. It is no coincidence that Celiberti often uses primary colours and essential signs, as though seeking to recover an original language capable of grasping the fundamental paradigms of life.

In his work emerges the idea that naming things somehow means creating them, restoring to them a lost meaning. After the tragedies of history, reality appears to require “renaming” in order to recover a primitive purity. For Celiberti, art is neither a profession nor an activity subject to economic considerations, but a true inner mission, and his works come together to form a great silent family. The creative process thus becomes a form of meditation and spiritual inquiry, in which the work is never a definitive point of arrival, but rather a stage in a constantly evolving journey. At the conceptual core of his research lies humanity in its most essential form, understood as a relationship between individuals and as a mysterious tension between earth and sky, memory and the future, individual experience and the universal dimension of existence. Alongside the exhibition, Dissociazione (1991–1994, fresco) will be displayed and will become part of the Gallery’s permanent collection.

Hearts, letters, erasures and windows positioned high above, beyond reach, become elements of the artist’s visual language through material roughness and the use of childlike symbols. The primitive colours, which become lighter in contrast to the dark, dramatic palette of his other works, move away from the most tragic periods and, by “dissociating” themselves, become a wish for a return to life, like a heartfelt call for forgiveness. With the addition of Dissociazione to the Museum’s collection, the Galleria Nazionale d’Arte Moderna e Contemporanea welcomes a significant work from the artist’s career, strengthening the dialogue between the collection and an artistic research that interweaves memory, matter and the universal dimension of human experience.