Artists

Giovanni Anselmo, Pier Paolo Calzolari, Mario et Marisa Merz, Giulio Paolini, Giuseppe Penone, Emilio Prini, Gilberto Zorio, Luciano Fabro, Jannis Kounellis, Michelangelo Pistoletto, Alighiero Boetti

Press release

The exhibition, curated by Carolyn Christov-Bakargiev, an internationally recognised expert in Arte Povera, retraces the history of this movement, from its birth in Italy to its spread across the world, through a large selection of major works by the thirteen main protagonists of Arte Povera. The exhibition will display important works of Arte Povera from the Pinault Collection, in resonance with pieces from the Castello di Rivoli museum and the Fondazione per l'Arte Moderna e Contemporanea CRT. The exhibition will also include works on loan from several other major private and public collections in France and Italy, including those of the Arte Povera artists themselves.

In the mid-1960s, various Italian artists began to exhibit together under the banner of “Arte Povera”, or “poor art”, a term invented in 1967 by the art critic and curator Germano Celant, who adapted it from the concept of “poor theatre” put forth by Polish experimental theatre director Jerzy Grotowski.