“Divisionism. The light of the modern” at Palazzo Roverella, Rovigo

From 2.25.2012 to 6.23.2012

Considered one of this year’s most important exhibitions in Italy, “Divisionism. The light of the modern” will be hosted at Palazzo Roverella from 25 February to 23 June 2012. Described as one of the most exciting times of Italian art in the last few centuries,  Divisionism is presented in this exhibition under a new light and with a perfect selection of works.

The period displayed spans from 1890 and the end of the First World War. At the time of Signac and Seurat’s pointillism, which gave raise to Neo Impressionism in France, a number of artists in Italy started experimenting with the separate use of complementary colours in an original way and with a clever interpretation of the light of the modern.

Considered the first effective departing from the styles of the preceding times, Divisionism was based on new experimentations that gave artists of the early 20th century the opportunity to depict, often with audacious and daring techniques the themes of the new centuries from the changing role of the agricultural world and the evolution of modern cities to the new scientific discoveries and the ensuing social conflicts.

Instead of relying on dots and coloured bars as in Neo Impressionism, Italian Divisionism made recourse to irregular filaments which were not juxtaposed, rather overlapped in a completely different spirit. This new painting technique is better suited at representing the friendship, happiness, spiritualism, symbolism, political ideology as well as the feelings and passions that were uniting the artists of this movement.

These painting contain light and colours and moreover, a whole range of emotions.

The exhibition at Palazzo Roverella covers this magic moment of art in Italy, and includes in its critic review artists that had until recently only occasionally attributed to Divisionism, such as Vittore Grubicy de Dragon, with his Divisionism of music and scientific research, and Plinio Novellini, the icon of Divisionism in Tuscany and Liguria and also the best representatives of the different local expressions of Divisionism, which are possibly the best characteristics of this movement.

This is, therefore, the ideal opportunity to widen the appreciation of a movement that puts together different local traditions and establishes altogether new style mutations compared to the realism of the 19th century.

With the inclusion of lesser known names next to the more established ones, such as Segantini, Morbelli and Pelizza da Volpedo, this exhibition allows visitors to discover artists that were capable of defining independent paths of light experimentations. The historic Divisionism Room of the 1914 Biennale is revisited as well as the extraordinary Divisionism works of Giacomo Ballà, Umberto Boccioni, Gino Severini, Carlo Carrà and the Roman Secession, which represent the final flashes of the artistic movement that developed into the revolutionary Futurism.

The exhibition is organized in six sections that present, in a logical time sequence, this extraordinary artistic movement:

First section
The period of Vittore Grubicy: Divisionism between science and music

Second section
Divisionism on the charge: the social drama from Morbelli to Pellizza

Third section
The vital cycle according to Divisionism: from Veneri to Parche

Fourth section
The heroic wing of Divisionism

Fifth section
The progress of light: the predecessors of Futurism

Sixth section
Towards Secession


Times:

Weekdays: 9am-9pm; Saturday 9am-8pm; Sunday 9am-8pm
Closed on Mondays

Tickets:
Adults: 9€;
Concessions: 7€;
Free: under 6, disabled and their assistant;
Young people: 5€ (from 7 to 18 years).

Reduced tickets at 5€: Tuesday and Wednesday 9am – 1pm.
Residents in Rovigo and surroundings. Free entry to returning visitors exhibiting their used tickets with free or reduced entry for their friends.
Family discount:
2 adults + 1 child (up to 18 years): 15€
2 adults + 2 children (up to 18 years): 20€
2 adults + 3 or more children (up to 18 years): 20€

Groups (min 20 people): 7€ and free for tour guides.