From 24 February to 19 March 2022, almost a year after the death of Turi Simeti, the gallery belonging to the artist’s daughter, Martina Simeti, will host a photographic show by Giovanna Silva, promoted by the newly established Fondazione Archivio Turi Simeti, in her exhibition space, Via Benedetto Marcello 44.
Giovanna Silva visited Turi Simeti’s studio shortly after his death. The photos were taken on several different occasions, in close succession. The hundred or so shots feature details from the studio. Each shot is repeated, with an almost imperceptible difference from the previous one, as if each immersion in this space afforded a different level of insight, a discovery renewed each time. There are no overarching visions but dense details emerging from his life story. “It was more than immersing oneself in a studio. It’s a home, an opus and a lifetime.”
What emerges is a collage of often similar fragments, images that portray the space through elements of those who inhabited it: Turi Simeti along with his partner Essila Burello, who was also taken away by the pandemic shortly after the artist.
The installation is designed with the technical support of architect Luciano Giorgi (LGB architetti), who also designed the gallery spaces.
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The Fondazione Archivio Turi Simeti in Milan sees the light at the request of the artist’s family. The mission, in keeping with the existing Archive, consists of promoting the work of the Sicilian-born painter, who moved to Milan in the mid-1960s.
The Archive will stage initiatives and undertake projects including exhibitions and catalogues, but will also invite young artists to dialogue with Simeti’s work, with the aim of bringing the new generations closer to one of the leading protagonists of Italian post-war abstract research.