Museo Ettore Fico Opens New Downtown Space MEF Outside

The Museo Ettore Fico (MEF) in Turin has expanded with a new exhibition space in the city center called MEF Outside. Located in the historic 19th-century Artigianelli complex, the 300-square-meter venue occupies the former Procope café and sits on the same block as Le Music-Hall, a performance hub directed by Arturo Brachetti that opened in June 2017. The space is provided rent-free for three years through an agreement with the Opera Torinese del Murialdo, a religious congregation founded by Saint Leonardo Murialdo dedicated to educating disadvantaged youth. MEF Outside launched with a double exhibition of Niki de Saint Phalle (born Neuilly-sur-Seine, October 29, 1930 – died San Diego, May 21, 2002). The downtown venue presents a retrospective spanning her early 1950s works to major pieces from the 1990s, including Nanas and Totems. Meanwhile, the main MEF location in the Barriera di Milano district displays works and projects related to the Tarot Garden, which the artist created as her monumental artistic testament in Capalbio, Grosseto. The exhibitions are produced by MEF in collaboration with the Niki de Saint Phalle Foundation in Santee, California, and the MAMAC in Nice. Director Andrea Busto described MEF Outside as a spin-off linking the peripheral and central parts of the city, and stated that the new space will continue to host monographic exhibitions on international contemporary art.