Benni Bosetto Transforms HangarBicocca into an Unpredictable Home

Benni Bosetto's exhibition 'Rebecca' at Pirelli HangarBicocca in Milan turns the museum's shed into a total domestic environment, erasing architectural references. Curated by Fiammetta Griccioli, the show takes its title from Daphne du Maurier's 1938 novel 'Rebecca'. An enormous eye made of shimmering fabric, 'La bocca' (2022), greets visitors. Hundreds of hand-drawn wallpaper strips, 'Le cellule' (2026), cover walls from ceiling to floor, disrupting the exhibition space and giving it the physicality of cohabiting bodies. The floor is mostly covered with green carpet and small rugs. Bosetto drew the wallpapers by hand over a year on tables of identical size; their figures are only recognizable up close. The installation includes lace curtains, doors laid on the ground, terracotta women's shoes, and a nightclub-like area with tables and chairs where professional dancers will perform 'Il Tango' (2023–2026) throughout the show. The space is gendered feminine, referencing the craft of weaving and embroidery as symbols of women's historical lack of authorship. Bosetto's practice connects to Virginia Woolf's 'A Room of One's Own' (1929) and Joseph Beuys's statement 'art is us'. The exhibition runs at Pirelli HangarBicocca in Milan.