Controcorrente: Mattia Moreni and Gastone Novelli Exhibitions in Italy

Two recent exhibitions in Italy highlight the careers of Mattia Moreni (1920-1999) and Gastone Novelli (1925-1968), artists who navigated postwar currents with independent vision. At MAMbo in Bologna, a reconstruction of Moreni's 1965 retrospective runs until May 31, while MAR in Ravenna presents his late work from the 1980s-1990s until May 3. At Ca' Pesaro in Venice, a Novelli retrospective closed in March. Both artists participated in the Italian Resistance during WWII: Moreni as a clandestine Communist Party member, Novelli arrested and tortured at 18. Moreni became a leading figure in Art Informel, known for gestural, visceral painting; Francesco Arcangeli linked him to American Abstract Expressionism with European roots (Cosmè Tura, Grünewald, Goya, Wols). Novelli, after time in Brazil where he met Max Bill, Le Corbusier, and Paul Klee's influence, evolved from Informel toward a unique form of Visual Poetry incorporating handwritten text. In 1968, Novelli famously turned his paintings to the wall at the Venice Biennale and wrote "La Biennale è fascista" in protest against police violence and the institution's fascist-era statute; the Grand Prize was not awarded that year. Novelli died later in 1968 at age 43. Moreni retreated to Romagna in 1966, and in the 1980s-1990s produced large, grotesque, post-human canvases anticipating digital and televisual degradation, a pessimistic response to Baselitz and Transavanguardia. He died in 1999.