MARION BARUCH – Un passo avanti tanti dietro

“Born between the wars, in 1929, in Timisoara, Romania, no longer Temesvár, Hungary. I was born very old to rejuvenate by living. Now I can say I am young.”

“For me, textiles is something that lives and throbs, I feel the ineffability of its breath or its flow, a continuous flow that is also that of the whole society, it reflects the history of humanity and, at the same time, the social dimension of work.”

The Museo Novecento is pleased to present from Saturday, March 15 to Sunday, June 8, Un passo avanti tanti dietro, the most extensive retrospective of Marion Baruch (Timisoara, 1929) in an Italian institution, curated by Sergio Risaliti and Stefania Rispoli. The exhibition, a tribute to an indefatigable and cosmopolitan artist, who was born in Romania but lived between Israel, France and Italy, will also extend into the spaces of Manifattura Tabacchi and Polimoda, which collaborated and contributed generously to the realization of the project, where several environmental installations will be presented.

The exhibition will make it possible to retrace her intense activity, nearly seventy years marked by continuous changes of course and new adventures, thanks to the presence of works emblematic of her multifaceted path, from the first works of the late 1950s to collaborations with designers such as Gavina, from performance sculptures to the birth of NAME DIFFUSION, from participatory works to fabric works made after the year two thousand.

An advocate of an idea of free authorship devoid of constraints and of an art that is always close to life, Baruch has moved with ease between different media, materials and disciplines, from fashion to design, visual arts, boundary of identity, women, patriarchy, the Internet and consumer society.

Ample space will be given to fabric works born out of an interest in the use of tailoring scraps and textile processing residues. Somewhere between sculpture, installation and ready-made, textiles are reinterpreted through an emotional approach that creates works that inhabit the space. Baruch selects and carefully places negatives of clothing clippings in which it sometimes appears to be possible to discern the absence of a sleeve or pant leg. The recognition of their previous use soon gives way to a new life as works of art.

The exhibition will also be accompanied by the screening of Francesca Molteni’s documentary dedicated to the artist.

Textile scraps are reinterpreted through an emotional approach that creates works that inhabit the space.