Rome,
On June 21, the Galleria Borghese opened to the public the exhibition “Louise Bourgeois: Unconscious Memories”, historic for several reasons: it is the first dedicated to a contemporary artist in this Roman villa and it also marks the debut exhibition in the Italian capital of the French-Canadian author, who did, however, maintain a fruitful relationship with Italian art throughout her extensive career.
Curated by Geraldine Leardi and Philip Larratt-Herrero and organised in collaboration with the Easton Foundation and the Académie de France – Villa Medici, this exhibition strengthens ties between Bourgeois’s personal memory and the collective memory contained in the Galleria throughout several of its rooms, the Aviary and the Meridiana Garden, spaces that the author admired in 1967, on her first visit to Rome. Approximately twenty of her pieces are displayed alongside masterpieces from the Borghese collection, in an installation that proposes relationships between them and the architecture of the place and between the emotional and psychological states that the artist explored from an extraordinary diversity of forms, materials and scales, and her vision of metamorphosis, and the human experiences to which the collections of this institution point.
It should be remembered that, in her seven decades of career, Bourgeois raised in her work advanced debates, still current, that linked contemporary creation, psychoanalysis and feminism, and that in the sixties, after a period of intense review of her personality and her experiences, she began to experiment with the use of latex, plaster, wax and other materials in the creation of biomorphic forms, prior to her Cellsautonomous structures in which he would work from the nineties, already Cellscomposed of sculpted elements, found objects and pieces that she would treasure throughout her life. In the last fifteen years of her career, fabrics would be the centre of her creations.
This artist’s knowledge of the collections held at the Galleria Borghese began during her studies at the Louvre in the 1930s, which she furthered during stays in Pietrasanta, Carrara and other Italian cities in 1967 and 1972, where she held various workshops and produced a significant number of works in bronze and marble. She returned to Italy in 1891 and 1991, executing a few more sculptures.
They have arrived at the Galleria Borghese Janus Fleuri, Topiary and Passage Dangereuxthree pieces linked to metamorphosis. The first, in symmetrical and ambiguous suspension, looks in two directions, making reference to the Roman deity who simultaneously addresses the past and the future, and to beginnings and transitions; Topiary reflects the growth and stages of development of a young woman, the transformations between youth and maturity; and Passage Dangereuxthe largest of the Cells Bourgeois also condenses, in the Lanfranco Salon, the journey of a girl until she becomes an adult.
Those Cells They are room-sized enclosures containing, as we said, found objects and sculpted forms and exploring issues linked to memory, desire, architecture and the five senses. In designing her own architectures, Bourgeois deployed complex orchestrations of motifs and symbols in which allusions to yesterday and today could be fused, ready to be contemplated and experienced: exactly what this Galleria was for Scipione Borghese.
We will also contemplate, Cell (The Last Climb)the penultimate work of this series, which opens the exhibition in the entrance hall with its basic spiral motif, which we will find again in the Aviary, in Spiral WomanThis shape, like the spiral staircase in the cell, is a metaphor for the endless cycles of life, and the blue spheres floating in space have strong spiritual connotations. Cell XX (Portrait)for its part, delves into the portrait of emotions from an intimate look at the human psyche; we can understand it as a deconstruction of the traditional portrait intended to emphasize emotional expression and psychological depth over status and social relationships, although delving into the complex framework that these imply in regards to personal identities.
In the garden of the Galleria he will come out to meet us The Welcoming Handsa sculpture made from casts of the artist’s hands intertwined with those of Jerry Gorovoy, who was not only a close friend but also her assistant for many years. They evoke dependence, intimacy and protection. Also one of her large bronze spiders, which pays homage to the protective character of Bourgeois’s mother, and which contrasts with the soft pink marble of her Linked Legsa delicate crossing of legs that we can consider an echo of the ankles of Canova’s Paulina Borghese.
In Untitled (No. 7)two other pairs of clasped hands symbolise refuge and protection and are once again a manifestation of his fondness for the transformation and fragmentation of the body. Finally, in the Hall of the Emperors we find a series of cloth heads (made from scraps of tapestries with floral or geometric motifs) that converse with the busts of illustrious men. With empty sockets and half-open mouths, supported by aluminium frames, they constitute here an evident questioning of the prestige and luxury of other centuries.
“Louise Bourgeois. “Unconscious memories”
Borghese Gallery
Piazzale Scipione Borghese, 5
Rome
From June 21 to September 15, 2024
