Carla Accardi retrospective at Palazzo delle Esposizioni in Rome

Palazzo delle Esposizioni in Rome presents the largest retrospective ever dedicated to Carla Accardi (Trapani, 1924 – Rome, 2014), running from March 6 to June 9, 2024. The exhibition marks the centenary of the Sicilian painter who consecrated Italian abstraction in the postwar period. Curated by Daniela Lancioni and Paola Bonani, the show features around 100 works dated from 1946 to 2014 across seven rooms on the piano nobile. The chronological path includes portions of installations conceived by Accardi herself, following her innovative approach to the relationship between artworks and space—a kind of "pittura-ambiente" that broke conventions. The exhibition opens with two self-portraits and early works, including "Vista su campo da tennis" (1947), never before exhibited or published in color. It progresses through her black-and-white works from 1955–1961, featuring recurring symbols she described as "the vital impulse in the world" (as told to Vanni Bramanti in 1982). The rotunda hosts "Triplice tenda" (1969–1971), now at the Centre Pompidou in Paris, an intimate environment integrating painting and space. Later rooms recreate Accardi's 1976 solo show at the cooperative of via Beato Angelico and her personal room at the 1988 Venice Biennale. The exhibition concludes with works from the 1990s and 2000s, where backgrounds and space are revolutionized, showing Accardi's self-referential dynamic of signs.