On the occasion of the Photo Vogue Festival, Galleria Fumagalli presents a photographic exhibition by Peter Welz “Portrait Malaparte”, dedicated to the imposing villa of the poet Curzio Malaparte on Capri Island.

Since 2008 the German artist Peter Welz works on the study and research of three subjects, which constitute the Portraits series: Francis Bacon, Casa Malaparte and Michelangelo Antonioni. The first is the “translation” of the unfinished self-portrait by Francis Bacon, the second is devoted to Casa Malaparte, and the third comes from (unpublished) specimens, studios and filming of the movie Red Desert (1964) by Michelangelo Antonioni.

The second portrait, Malaparte, comes from the interest and the studies of Peter Welz on motion and architecture, among which the construction of the installation “Retranslation | Final Unfinished Portrait (Francis Bacon)”, produced in collaboration with the choreographer William Forsythe and presented at the Musée du Louvre in Paris in 2005. Taking to its limits this investigation on the move, in the series Malaparte Peter Welz works on definitions and concepts of space and architecture making fluid even the rigid structures.

Casa Malaparte is an austere building, elegant and modern, located on the island of Capri on a steep and narrow rocky promontory, which seems almost to emerge from the rocks, dotted ground by a trapezoidal staircase that stretches to the sea. Designed by the architect Adalberto Libera, it is considered one of the masterpieces of modern architecture, representing a wonderful example of integration between rationalist modernity and natural environment. The villa has had illustrious guests, including Jean Cocteau, Albert Camus, Alberto Moravia, Pablo Picasso, Palmiro Togliatti, André Breton and others, besides having inspired by Jean-Luc Godard in 1963 who turned the film Le Mépris, which is famous for the scene in which Michel Piccoli and Brigitte Bardot, covered only by a yellow book, sunbathing on the roof of the Villa.