Emilio Isgrò's 'Ulysses' Exhibition at M77 Gallery in Milan

Emilio Isgrò (born 1937 in Barcellona Pozzo di Gotto) presents 'Ulysses' at M77 Gallery in Milan, curated by Claire Gilman, Chief Curator of the Drawing Center in New York. The exhibition explores the myth of Odysseus through Isgrò's signature 'cancellature' (erasures), engaging with interpretations by Homer, Dante, James Joyce, and Herman Melville. The show runs from November 18, 2023, to March 16, 2024. It features historical works like 'Dichiaro di non essere Emilio Isgrò' (1971), erased maps of the Aegean Sea, Lipari Sea, and Mediterranean basin, and for the first time, the eight volumes of 'Odissea cancellata' (1968). The first floor installation culminates with negative erasures (gray on black) dedicated to Melville's 'Moby Dick,' with phrases from the novel interacting with three pedestals supporting Dante's 'Inferno' Canto XXVI, Joyce's 'Ulysses,' and Melville's novel. The exhibition concludes with a pictogram of Moby Dick's tail. Gilman describes Isgrò as a 'truly multifaceted spirit' who created a new genre by merging verbal language and visual form in the early 1960s, and notes that 'Ulysses' represents the culmination of his long-term commitment to recovering the value of words in an image-saturated culture.