Curating Fascism

Curating Fascism examines how exhibitions from around the fall of Benito Mussolini's regime to the present day have shaped collective memory, historical narratives, and political discourse around the Italian ventennio. It explores representations of Italian fascism in exhibitions across the world, highlights blindspots in art history and exhibition practices, and charts how shows on fascism have evolved since the postwar period. Through offering fresh perspectives on the historiography, collective memory, and understanding of Italian fascist art from a contemporary standpoint, Curating Fascism critically reflects upon curatorial strategies and sheds light on the cultural legacy of fascism in the current moment.

Sharon Hecker is an art historian and curator of Italian art. She is the author of A Moment's Monument: Medardo Rosso and the International Origins of Modern Sculpture (2017), and co-editor of Postwar Italian Art History: Untying 'the Knot' (2018) and Lead in Modern and Contemporary Art (2021). Raffaele Bedarida is Associate Professor of Art History at Cooper Union, USA. He is the author of Corrado Cagli: La pittura, l'esilio, L'America (2018; English edition forthcoming) and Exhibiting Italian Art in the United States from Futurism to Arte Povera (2022).

List of Figures Notes on Contributors Acknowledgments Introduction Part One: Rethinking Historical Exhibitions in Italy 1. Exhibiting Art of the Fascist Ventennio: Curatorial Choices, Installation Strategies, and Critical Reception from Arte Moderna in Italia 1915-1935 (Florence, 1967) to Annitrenta (Milan, 1982), Luca Quattrocchi, University of Siena, Italy 2. Pluralism as Revisionism: Annitrenta at Palazzo Reale, Milan, 1982, Denis Viva, the University of Trento, Italy 3. Interview with Renato Barilli, Curator of Annitrenta Exhibition at Palazzo Reale (Milan, 1982), Raffaele Bedarida, Cooper Union, New York, USA 4. Art, Life, Politics, and the Seductiveness of Italian Fascism: Post Zang Tumb Tuuum at Fondazione Prada (Milan, 2018), Sharon Hecker and Raffaele Bedarida, Art historian and Curator, Italy; Cooper Union, New York, USA 5. Italy's Holocaust on Display: From Carpi-Fossoli to Auschwitz (to Florence), Robert S. C. Gordon, Cambridge University, UK 6. Umbertino Umbertino: The Many Masks of Rome's Palazzo delle Esposizioni, Romy Golan, the Graduate Center, CUNY, USA Part Two: Exhibitions of Fascism Around the World 7. Exhibiting and Collecting the F-word in Britain, Rosalind McKever, Curator, the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, UK 8. Novecento Brasiliano: Margherita Sarfatti, Ciccillo Matarazzo, and the Italian Collection of MAC USP, Ana Gonçalves Magalhães, University of São Paulo (MAC USP), Brazil 9. Contextualizing Razionalismo in the exhibition Photographic Recall (2019): Fascist Spaces in Contemporary German Photography, Miriam Paeslack, University at Buffalo (SUNY), New York, USA 10. Feeling at Home: Exhibiting Design, Blurring Fascism, Elena Dellapiana and Jonathan Mekinda, the Politecnico di Torino, Italy; University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC), USA 11. Italian Jewish Artists and Fascist Cultural Politics: on Gardens and Ghettos at the Jewish Museum in New York (1989), Emily Braun, Hunter College and the Graduate Center, CUNY, USA, interviewed by Raffaele Bedarida and Sharon Hecker Part Three: Absences 12. Exhibiting the Homoerotic Body, the Queer Afterlife of Ventennio Male Nudes, John Champagne Penn State Erie, the Behrend College, USA 13. "Partigiano Portami Via": Exhibiting Antifascism and the Resistance in Post-Fascist Italy, Raffaele Bedarida, Cooper Union, New York, USA 14. Looking at Women and Mental Illness in Fascist Italy: An Exhibition's Dialogical and Feminist Approach, Lucia Re, University of California, Los Angeles, USA 15. Silencing the Colonial Past: The 1993 Exhibition Architettura italiana d'oltremare 1870-1940 in Bologna, Nicola Labanca, University of Siena, Italy 16. Recharting Landscapes in the Exhibition Roma Negata: Postcolonial Routes of the City (2014) and the Digital Project Postcolonial Italy: Mapping Colonial Heritage, Shelleen Greene University of California, Los Angeles, USA Part Four: Curatorial Practices 17. From MRF to Post Zang Tumb Tuuum: The Responsibilities of the Re-hang, Vanessa Rocco, Southern New Hampshire University, Manchester, USA 18. The Final Ramp: Addressing Fascism in Italian Futurism at the Guggenheim Museum, Vivien Greene and Susan Thompson, the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, USA; Curator and Writer, Brooklyn, USA 19. The Making of MART and the Archivio del Novecento: Interview with Gabriella Belli, Director of the Foundation from the Municipal Museums of Venice 20. Now You See It, Now You Don't: Reconstructing Artists' Studios in Exhibitions on Fascist-Era Art, Sharon Hecker, Art Historian and Curator, Italy 21. Interview with Maaza Mengiste on Project 3541: A Photographic Archive of the 1935-41 Italo-Ethiopian War, Raffaele Bedarida and Sharon Hecker, Art historian and Curator, Italy; Cooper Union, New York, USA Index