Franco Vaccari’s Dreamscapes at P420 Gallery in Bologna

P420 Gallery in Bologna presents a solo exhibition of Franco Vaccari, opened during the busy days of Arte Fiera. The show marks a departure from the artist’s earlier theoretical work, focusing instead on a phenomenological reworking of the past through pictorial illustration. Vaccari, born in Modena in 1936, has developed this recent body of work over a long period: initially conceived in the 1980s as sketchbook notes, it has materialized in recent years as an integration of painting and photographic print. The central theme is the unconscious and its manifestations, with each canvas serving as a visual elaboration of dream narratives. While dream representation is a classic trope in Surrealism and psychoanalysis, Vaccari insists on its real dimension through a series of figurative interventions with swift brushstrokes on anastatic prints. The second room features a striking video: a looming asteroid threatens and spares the viewer, effectively splitting the exhibition into two paths. The real has migrated into the territory of mental projections, but the message it sends from there remains opaque.