Franco Guerzoni

Franco Guerzoni was born in 1948 in Modena, where he lives and works. In 1970 he undertakes various, non-traditional and often ephemeral practices of artistic production, very experimental and close to photography; the context is of strong conceptual influence and intense exchange with other young artists, Franco Vaccari, Claudio Parmiggiani, Giuliano Della Casa, Carlo Cremaschi, Luigi Ghirri. In 1973 he held his first solo exhibition at the G7 Gallery in Bologna, Archeology. In recent years, the artist paid great attention to the archaeological world and to memory, also developing book-works that deal with the themes of travel, the image and its ambiguity. He travels to Turkey, Iran, Afghanistan, India and Nepal; passages witnessed by exhibitions such as Blow-Up (1976), Foto-grafia, curated by Arturo Carlo Quintavalle in 1977, and Begram's Treasure (1978) by Trisorio di Napoli. In the early Eighties he approaches painting intended as a materialization and not a representation of the wall or "rest" where his personal archaeological operation takes place: large chalky papers are born, exhibited in Travel Cards, at the Roman Villa in Florence. conceptual ?, at the Rotonda della Besana, and superficial excavations at the Civic Gallery of Modena. At the end of the decade Guerzoni undertook great cycles of works such as Decorations and Ruins, presented at the Venice Biennale in 1990, and Temporary Restorations, at the Municipal Gallery of Modern Art in Bologna. A large retrospective was set up in 1996 at the Civic Gallery of Contemporary Art in Trento, while the personal Orienti was held in 1999 at Palazzo Massari in Ferrara. In 2002 he held a solo show at the Ettersburg Schloss in Weimar, in 2004 at Palazzo Forti in Verona and in 2006 at the GAM in Turin. In 2011 his work is included in the Italian Pavilion of the LIV Venice Biennale while in 2013 Palazzo Pitti organizes the anthological The Forgotten Wall. Among his most recent solo shows there are only Nowhere, Nowhere. Stray trips with Luigi Ghirri, at the Milan Triennale, Archeologies without restoration at the MAMbo in Bologna.

Source: exhibition at the Museo del Novecento