Where and when
The following spoke:Roberta Cerini Baj, Luca Bochicchio, Chiara Gatti and Angela Sanna
Enrico Baj
(1924-2003), a well-known Milanese artist and intellectual who died in 2003, was recently the subject of the exhibition Enrico Baj. The invasion of ultrabodies, set up at the Regional Archaeological Museum of Aosta. After the success of this retrospective, dedicated to the theme of Ultracorpo, figure in which converge, with bold irony, the new myths of science fiction and the mirror of a widespread malaise in everyday life and the usual rhythms of the middle class, The artist returns to be the protagonist of an exhibition with an unprecedented cut promoted by the museum of Milan for contemporary art: Mirabili mostri. The Apocalypse according to Baj (6 November 2016 – 26 February 2017), curated by Roberta Cerini Baj, Chiara Gatti, Emma Zanella. Fulcrum of a single cultural project that unites the two locations of the MA*GA of Gallarate and Palazzo Leone da Perego in Legnano, this initiative presents a thrust on a single theme and an important narrative cycle, the monumental installation of the Apocalypse to which Enrico Baj worked at the turn of the seventies and eighties, adding silhouette, character to character, in a carousel of evil and grotesque creatures, a carousel of exuberant monstrosities, a psychedelic abyss of macabre dances conceived to be the mirror of a world in decline, spoiled by well-being to the point of not noticing the whirlpool that swallows it. Starting from these themes, the conference proposes a meeting on the multifaceted and controversial figure of the artist in which the widow will participate, Roberta Cerini Baj, who will remember some episodes of the artistic career of the master and his contacts with prominent cultural figures, from Raymond Queneau to André Breton, from Marcel Duchamp to Asger Jorn, from Edoardo Sanguineti to Piero Manzoni. Following the contributions of Chiara Gatti on the theme of Ultracorpo and the Apocalypse seen in an anthropological perspective; that of Luca Bochicchio on the theme of “modifications” in Baj and Jorn and, finally, that of Angela Sanna on the founding role of Baj in Pataphysics.
Luca Bochicchio
is an art historian, critic and curator. PhD in Arts, Entertainment and Multimedia Technologies, since 2009 has carried out research in Italy, Argentina, France and Denmark on behalf of the DIRAAS University of Genoa. At the same university he is still a collaborator of the Archive of Contemporary Art. Since 2011 he has curated the muda project Museo Diffuso Albisola, which includes the Casa Museo Jorn of which he has been artistic director since 2015. Among the recent exhibitions he curated: EARTH! The streets of ceramics between Liguria and Piedmont (with Andreina D’Agliano, Museums of Turin, Castellamonte, Mondovì, Savona and Albisole, in progress); Antonietta Raphael. Continuity of myth (Galleria Narciso, Turin 2015); Baj. Figures of the imaginary 1951-2003 (Museo d’Arte di Palazzo Gavotti, Savona 2015); Nero/Critica in Arte (Museo d’Arte della Città di Ravenna, 2014); Asger Jorn. Oltre la Forma (Museums of Savona and Albisola 2014). The monograph Sculpture and memory is coming out. Leoncillo, i caduti e i sopravvissuti (Mimesis 2016, cds). In 2014 he edited with Paola Valenti the book Asger Jorn. Oltre la Forma/The Form and Beyond (Genova University Press). In 2013 he edited with Franco Sborgi the volume Ceramica contemporanea all’aperto. Conservation and restoration studies (Aracne). He is also author of essays in catalogues, volumes and magazines such as “The Black Man”, “Elephant & Castle”, “Form”, “Material Culture Review”, “Educational Technologies”, “Faenza”, “Kaypunku”, “Opuscula Musealia”. He regularly collaborates with the magazines “Espoarte” and “La Ceramica in Italia e nel mondo”.
Roberta Cerini
she met Enrico Baj in 1964 and became his life partner, marrying him in 1966. Since those years, full of activities in every sector of art and rich in exchanges and meetings with the world of culture,Roberta Baj actively participates in the artistic affairs of her husband by coming into contact with the intelligentsia and artists of a vast international entourage. Witness, accomplice and prominent consultant in the organization of numerous exhibitions focused on Baj, he curated, among other things, the archival and photographic section of the artist’s general catalogues. Roberta Baj is the owner and manager of the Baj Archive (Vergiate), of which she has catalogued and arranged the impressive collection of correspondence, documents, photographs, catalogues, books and works. Her role as an adviser and expert of the artist’s work today offers an indispensable contribution to the study of his work and to the planning and organization of events related to him. In addition to having collaborated in person at important exhibitions recently created, including Enrico Baj. Bambini, ultracorpi e altre storie (Milano, Fondazione Arnaldo Pomodoro), Enrico Baj (New York, Luxembourg & Dayan), Baj Mobili Animati (Milano, Fondazione Giorgio Marconi), has been curator or co-curator of the exhibitions Baj Dalla materia alla figura(Castiglioncello, Castello Pasquini), Baj Figure dell’immaginario 1951-2003 (Savona, Museo d’Arte e Palazzo Gavotti), Enrico Baj Apocalisse (Pietrasanta, Chiostro di Sant’Agostino), Enrico Baj. The invasion of ultrabodies (Aosta, Regional Archaeological Museum-Legnano, Palazzo Leone da Perego).
Chiara Gatti
is an art historian and critic, a specialist in modern and contemporary sculpture and graphics. He writes for the pages of the newspaper La Repubblica. He has edited monographs and critical texts dedicated, among others, to Édouard Manet, Adolfo Wildt, George Rouault, Joan Miró, Umberto Boccioni, Carlo Carrà, Leone Lodi, Marino Marini, Fausto Melotti, Angelo Bozzola, Gianfranco Ferroni, Enrico Baj, Maria Lai, Carlo Ramous, Mimmo Paladino, Bernardí Roig. He has developed scientific contributions on topics such as: textile art between primitive culture and the recovery of weaving in the context of contemporary visual arts; anarchist thought conveyed by the French anarchist magazines of the late nineteenth century. Futurism and the aesthetics of speed. He has published for the publishing house Bruno Mondadori, the manual of contemporary art The art among us. To Alberto Giacometti has dedicated numerous publications, linked to a series of exhibitions in various European venues, analyzed the relationship of the master with archaic cultures. He also signed Unusual Nativity for the Interlinea editions. Recently, for the Museo Francesco Messina in Milan, in collaboration with the Institut du Monde Arabe in Paris, he curated the exhibition Il mio nome è cavallo. Images between East and West, produced by the Municipality of Milan and Officina Libraria under the patronage of ICOM.
Angela Sanna
is professor of History of Contemporary Art at the Academies of Fine Arts. Graduated in Art History at the University of Florence, she has a PhD (PhD) and a postgraduate degree at the Université de Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne. He has carried out numerous researches and publications, in Italy and France, oriented on several aspects of modern and contemporary art, from the relations between Milan and Paris in the post-war period, with particular reference to the work of Enrico Baj and the post-war movementsurrealist Phases, to the poetic writings of Baj, André Breton, Lucio Fontana, Edouard Jaguer. He has collaborated with institutions, museums and galleries including the Centre Pompidou (Paris), the Arnaldo Pomodoro Foundation (Milan), the Archaeological Museum of Aosta, the Academy of Drawing Arts (Florence), the Pecci Museum (Prato) and, in particular, the Rodolfo Siviero Museum (Florence), of which he published catalogues of works from the Middle Ages to the eighteenth and twentieth centuries, as well as various writings related to the relations between Siviero and the art of the ‘900. He has curated and/or collaborated on several exhibitions of contemporary artists, also dealing with monographs, writings and DVDs on museums and masters of international resonance.