Maurizio Cattelan Opens Pop-Up Bar SGRAPPA E VIA! in Milan's Navigli District

From May 28 to 30, 2021, a pop-up bar called SGRAPPA E VIA! operates in Milan's Navigli district, serving takeaway cocktails based on Sgrappa, a grappa launched months earlier by artist Maurizio Cattelan with marketing director Paolo Dalla Mora and Gufram's Charley Vezza. The bar features a single small window on Ripa di Porta Ticinese, reminiscent of a "ruota degli esposti" or a cloistered nun's speaking hatch, designed to keep the identities of both server and customer hidden. The project was developed with the creative agency Paride Vitale. Sgrappa is an artisanal distillate produced in Piedmont from red grape pomace using small discontinuous copper steam stills, with an aroma evoking fruit and white flowers. Cocktails include Sgrappa al Salto, Sgrappa Tonic, Sgrappa Sour, and provocative names like Fuck You, Fuck You Too, and Fuck on the Beach, referencing Cattelan's famous middle-finger sculpture in Piazza Affari, Milan, which also appears on the bottle. Cattelan describes the bottle as containing "a message that can work for everyone, for those you love, but also for those who annoy you." The pop-up comes weeks after the announcement of Cattelan's major retrospective "Breath Ghosts Blind" at Pirelli HangarBicocca in Milan in 2022, spanning his thirty-year career with both historic and new works. The exhibition will explore existential themes like fragility of life, memory, and loss through ironic and corrosive language.