A Conversation about Medardo Rosso and Cy Twombly
November 20, 2014
It is a great pleasure for CIMA to host Nicholas Cullinan, curator at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and Isabelle Dervaux, curator at the Morgan Library & Museum, in conversation with CIMA fellow Francesco Guzzetti to explore the resonances between Medardo Rosso and Cy Twombly.
Each season, CIMA chooses a contemporary artist to put in dialogue with the artist who is the main focus of the annual exhibition and research program. This year CIMA presents Cy Twombly, pioneer of abstraction, in relation with Medardo Rosso, thus highlighting the modernity of Rosso’s drawings and photographic practice, as well as the great impact he had on the artists of the second half of twentieth century.
Nicholas Cullinan is Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art at The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. Before joining the Met, he was Curator of International Modern Art at Tate Modern in London, where he worked on numerous major exhibitions, including Duchamp, Man Ray, Picabia (2008); Cy Twombly: Cycles and Seasons (2008); Pop Life: Art in a Material World (2009); Tacita Dean: FILM, the twelfth Unilever commission for the Turbine Hall (2011); Edvard Munch: The Modern Eye (2012); Henri Matisse: The Cut-Outs and Kazimir Malevich (both 2014). He also curated contemporary group shows at Tate Modern, such as Learn to Read (2007) and Stutter (2009). He has taught at institutions including the Courtauld Institute of Art in London and curated independent projects such as the exhibition Twombly and Poussin: Arcadian Painters at the Dulwich Picture Gallery, London, and the Fondazione Prada’s opening exhibition for Ca’ Corner della Regina, Venice (both 2011). He is the author of many essays on modern and contemporary art for exhibition catalogues, and articles for publications such as Artforum, The Burlington Magazine, Frieze, Kaleidoscope, Mousse, October, and Tate Etc.
Isabelle Dervaux is the Acquavella Curator of Modern and Contemporary Drawings at the Morgan Library & Museum. She holds a Ph.D. in Art History from the Institute of Fine Arts, New York University. Before joining the Morgan in 2005 she held curatorial positions at the National Gallery of Art, Washington DC, and at the National Academy Museum, New York. At the Morgan, she organized the exhibitions From Berlin to Broadway: The Ebb Bequest of Modern German and Austrian Drawings (2007); Drawing Connections: Baselitz, Kelly, Penone, Rockburne, and the Old Masters (2007); Philip Guston: Works on Paper (2008); Roy Lichtenstein: The Black-and-White Drawings, 1961–1968 (2010); Dan Flavin: Drawing (2012); Josef Albers in America: Painting on Paper (2012); Drawing Surrealism (2013); Subliming Vessel: The Drawings of Matthew Barney (2013); and, currently on view, Cy Twombly: Treatise on the Veil.
Francesco Guzzetti is a doctoral candidate at the Scuola Normale Superiore, Pisa. His dissertation concerns the artistic dialogues between Italy and the United States in the 1960s and 1970s, comparing the productions of Conceptual and Arte Povera artists and their ways of rereading the work of earlier artists. In 2010 he curated the exhibition Focus: Ennio Morlotti, 1945-47 at the Museo del Novecento, Milan; his book about Morlotti and the critical reception of Picasso in Italy during the 1940s will be published in 2015. Among his other publications are “Carrà di fronte a Giotto: la monografia del 1924 per Valori Plastici” (ONH Opera Nomina Historiae, forthcoming 2015) and “Marini, o della policromia / Marini, or on polychromy” in the exhibition catalogue Marino Marini: Cavalli e Cavalieri / Horses and Riders (Museo d’Arte Moderna, Nuora; Silvana Editoriale, 2012). For his CIMA fellowship he will be conducting research on Rosso’s legacy and critical reception after World War II between Italy and the United States.
PROGRAM SCHEDULE
6:00 Registration and Aperitivo of Nino Franco Prosecco, presented by Terlato Wines
6:30 Conversation followed by Q&A
