Cesare Berlingeri's Folded Works Return to Cosenza After 50 Years

Cesare Berlingeri (born 1948 in Cittanova) presents a solo exhibition at Villa Rendano in Cosenza, marking his return to the city where he discovered his artistic vocation in the early 1970s. While working as a stage designer, Berlingeri observed stagehands folding velvet carpets he had created for a theater set at the Teatro Alfonso Rendano. This mundane act became a revelation, leading him to adopt folding, wrapping, and crumpling as central motifs in his practice. The exhibition, curated by gallerist Marilena Sirangelo, spans two floors of the Renaissance villa. On the piano nobile, monochrome rolls from the Barocco Nero, Rosso, Blu e Argento series (2016) stand like monoliths, contrasting with a late-19th-century piano once owned by Rendano. New works on paper (2020) explore flattened folds that retain their form. In the second sala, Costellazione (2017) comprises folded canvases of varying sizes arranged at angles. The Volumi series (2019-20) replaces folds with extroflection. Avvolgere la notte (2013) features blue illumination reminiscent of star rolls arranged vertically. On the second floor, the Museo multimediale Consentia Itinera, created by the Fondazione Attilio e Elena Giuliani, offers immersive projections about the city's origins. Berlingeri responds with rolled and crumpled canvases that reference Claude Monet's Les Meules, emphasizing the permanence of physical objects against ephemeral technology.