Double Solo Show of Printmakers Maria Pina Bentivenga and Mei Chen Tseng at Istituto Centrale per la Grafica

The Istituto Centrale per la Grafica in Rome hosts a double solo exhibition titled 'Immediati dintorni' featuring artists Maria Pina Bentivenga (born 1973 in Matera) and Mei Chen Tseng (born 1977 in Taiwan). The show highlights a dialogue between Western and Eastern printmaking techniques: Bentivenga works with etching on zinc, creating light, dreamlike compositions that transform landscape elements, recalling the Nordic imaginary of Wenzel Hablik. Tseng employs woodcut, a muscular technique, to achieve atmospheric painterly effects, compared by Michela Becchis in the catalog to Chinese calligraphic-painting tradition, oscillating between Rome and Taipei. The exhibition also includes a collection of artist's editions celebrating the material proximity to poetry, as referenced in the title borrowed from Vittorio Sereni's collection of writings. This show is part of a new direction by the Institute to systematically valorize women artists in the peripheral field of printmaking.