Screens: Folding Screens from the 17th to 21st Centuries

Statement:

“Screens: Folding Screens from the 17th to 21st Centuries ” is the extensive exhibition curated by Nicholas Cullinan which investigates the history and interprets the meanings of the screens, retracing the trajectories of mutual contamination between East and West, the processes of hybridization between different art forms and functions, collaborations between designers and artists and, finally, the creation of new works. The screens represent the concept of liminality and the threshold between two conditions, in a literal and metaphorical sense, as they cross the barriers between different disciplines, cultures and worlds.

As Nicholas Cullinan explains, “Painting or sculpture? Art or furnishing accessory? Utilitarian or ornamental element? Decorative, functional, architectural or theatrical? This exhibition examines with an innovative approach the questions and paradoxes surrounding the history of screens, a history of cultural migration (from East to West), of hybridization (between different art forms and functions) and of what is hidden and revealed . Our research will reveal how this history and its manifestation in the present coincide with the history of liminal objects and liminality itself, in a process of overcoming the rigid distinctions and hierarchies between the different disciplines of art and architecture, decoration of 'interiors and design'.

The exhibition project conceived by the SANAA architecture studio brings together over seventy screens in the spaces of the Podium. Included here are both works of great historical value and more recent works from international museums and private collections, as well as a selection of new creations specially commissioned for this project by more than fifteen international artists.

On the ground floor of the Podium, curvilinear and transparent Plexiglas walls, alternating with sinuous curtains, evoke the shapes of these objects, creating a series of spaces characterized by different lighting conditions. Inside these environments, visitors meet the various thematic groups and are confronted with a fluid exhibition itinerary thanks to the transparency of the dividing structures. On the upper floor the display represents the entire history of the screens, presented in chronological order and arranged on shaped pedestals that will emphasize their forms, in homage to the innovative museum displays of the MASP of São Paulo, created by Lina Bo Bardi, and to the work by SANAA for the Louvre-Lens museum.

Artists on display