Palazzo Fortuny – The Fortuny – A Family Story
Yun Hyong-Keun - A Retrospective
Exhibitions
Photograph and copyright Manfredi Bellati
Palazzo Fortuny
The Fortuny – A Family Story
Yun Hyong-keun
- A Retrospective
Exhibitions
At Palazzo
Fortuny, until November 24, in the palazzo
that used to be Mariano Fortuny y
Madrazo’s home, workshop and atelier, two exhibitions pay tribute to
the home’s owner and to his father with the exhibition The Fortuny. A Family Story and
to Yun Hyong-keun, the “guest of
honor”, with the first international retrospective dedicated to the Korean painter – 1928-2007.
Palazzo Fortuny
The Fortuny – A Family Story
The Fortuny.
A Family Story,
curated by Daniela Ferretti with Cristina Da Roit and in collaboration with the Axel and May Vervoordt Foundation, marks the seventieth anniversary of the death of Mariano Fortuny y Madrazo. The exhibition pays tribute to the versatile Spanish artist by highlighting the
importance of the family context in his artistic development. For the first time, this exhibition focuses on
both father and son: Mariano Fortuny y
Marsal - 1838-1874 - and his son Mariano
Fortuny y Madraz - 1871-1949 - by
exploring two main, interwoven threads in the artistic lives of the two great Spaniards: the practice of painting as
an intrinsic European tradition
established by the ancient masters, and the passion for collecting as an
opportunity for study and artistic development.
Photograph and copyright Manfredi Bellati
Mariano
Fortuny y Madrazo – Self-portrait – 1935c.
Mariano
Fortuny y Madrazo – Henriette – 1905 c.
Photograph and copyright Manfredi Bellati
The Atelier
Fortuny
Madrazo’s
genius led him to broaden his horizons, interpreting the Wagnerian ideal of a total work of art that had so fascinated him
in his youth. While in painting the technique and the felicitous
touch of his father remained unsurpassed, it was in the versatility of the
application of his own genius that the son revealed his numerous talents.
Combining art and science, art and technology, he ranged across the fields of painting and sculpture to photography, graphics, interior
decoration, clothing, set design, lighting. In so doing, he produced fabrics, dresses, tempera colours, patenting technological
inventions and creating a thriving entrepreneurial activity. In short, he gave
life to that multi‐faceted but coherent whole that is the “Mariano Fortuny Venise” brand.
Photograph courtesy Palazzo Fortuny - MuVe
Mariano
Fortuny y Marsal
The Painter’s Children in a Japanese Room -
1874
Madrid, Museo Nacional del Prado
Madrid, Museo Nacional del Prado
Mariano Fortuny y Madrazo
Panoramic Photograph of Venice – 1905c.
Panoramic Photograph of Venice – 1905c.
Photograph and copyright Manfredi Bellati
Photograph and copyright Manfredi Bellati
Yun Hyong-keun
Photograph and copyright Manfredi Bellati
The very dark shade of pigment Yun Hyong-keun used, a combination of ultramarine blue and burnt umber, was spread with a large brush in highly diluted successive layers that gradually impregnated the raw canvas. The ultramarine blue and burnt umber symbolise the sky and the earth, while the application of the paint parallels the phenomenon of water, which generates life by soaking into the porosity of the ground.
Mariano
Fortuny y Madrazo
A
wide selection of clothes which made the name of Mariano Fortuny Madrazo known to the world are on display: first of
all, the Delphos, but also cloaks
and capes in silk velvet, the Knossos scarves
in a very light gauze, as well as antique fabrics, shields, daggers and
preciously decorated armour, engravings, watercolours and drawings, models for
theatre sets, photographs, work tools, to recreate the atmosphere of intense
creativity that once animated the palazzo.
Private
Library of Mariano Fortuny
Palazzo Fortuny
Yun Hyong-keun - A Retrospective
Yun Hyong-keun - A Retrospective
The first European
retrospective exhibition of Yun Hyong-keun,
until November 24 is curated by Kim
Inhye in collaboration with National Museum of Modern and Contemporary
Art – MMCA - Seoul, with
the support of Korea Foundation. Yun Hyong-keun - Cheongju 1928 – Seoul 2007
- was one of the most important post-World
War II Korean artists. The decision to present Yun Hyong-keun’s work in Venice was also based on the conviction
that his art is in particular harmony with this city of land and water.
The World of Yun Hyong-keun
The Atelier
“Every day is the same. Feeling
empty in my heart, I’m wasting my life without remorse. Letting the endlessly boring days slide
by. Winter snow brings Spring, but that
doesn’t necessarily apply to life. I
think about life ending without anyone else noticing.”
Yun Hyong-keun
Yun Hyong-keun
Yun Hyong-keun’s life was
marked by his country’s troubled history: he was repeatedly imprisoned for his
freedom of expression, and in 1950 he miraculously escaped a group execution by
firing squad. Out of forty companions only he and four others survived. After an
initial phase of experimentation, his artistic style developed and became
defined in the first half of the 1970s. It reflects the harshness he suffered,
and is centred on a few essential elements.
“The
premise of my painting is the door of heaven and earth. Blue is the colour of
the sky; brown is the colour of the earth. So, I call them ‘heaven and earth’;
the portal gives structure to the composition”.
Yun Hyong-keun
The very dark shade of pigment Yun Hyong-keun used, a combination of ultramarine blue and burnt umber, was spread with a large brush in highly diluted successive layers that gradually impregnated the raw canvas. The ultramarine blue and burnt umber symbolise the sky and the earth, while the application of the paint parallels the phenomenon of water, which generates life by soaking into the porosity of the ground.
Photograph courtesy Palazzo Fortuny - MuVe
The Wabi Pavilion – A Tribute to Fortuny
Installation
– Axel Vervoordt – Tatsuro Miki
The Wabi
Pavilion is dedicated to the Fortuny
family, to pay tribute to the figure of the son, Mariano Fortuny y Madrazo, evoking his presence through an
itinerary scattered with his personal objects. A space created to offer
visitors a space for introspection, almost an initiatory experience. The attic
of the palazzo was not occupied by the Spanish
artist, therefore a place for new beginnings.
The
Manuscripts
Manifattura Fortuny
Matrixes -
for
fabric printing – post 1910
Manifattura Fortuny
Curtain – 1910 c.
Surcoat – post 1909
