Fondazione Baruchello Opens City Outpost in Rome's Gianicolo District

The Fondazione Baruchello has inaugurated a new 300-square-meter space in central Rome, located at Via del Vascello 35 in the Gianicolo district. The venue, once a printing house, has been meticulously restored with lighting by Zumtobel, a courtyard, and surrounding greenery. The foundation, established in 1998 at Gianfranco Baruchello's farm on Via di Cornelia outside Rome, now operates a "branch" in the city center. The inaugural exhibition, curated by Maria Alicata, features four hypothetical cultural "start-ups" in separate rooms. One room includes desks for pitch sessions where project authors convince patrons or entrepreneurs. The start-ups include: selling wooden sheep from an ideal flock with branding and instructions; exchanging large soil clods to create transnational gardens; an agency producing anomalous, non-functional objects dreamed up by artists (Massimo Bartolini, Felice Levini, H. H. Lim, Jimmie Durham, Bruna Esposito); and a basement space stimulating imagination and utopia. The opening took place on November 9, 2016, at 7 PM. Gianfranco Baruchello (born 1924 in Livorno), Carla Subrizi (president of the foundation), and curator Maria Alicata presented the space and its future plans.