Robert Kuśmirowski's 'PERSO[A]NOMALIA' Explores Memory and Loss at MAMbo Bologna

The Sala delle Ciminiere of MAMbo in Bologna has been transformed for the first solo exhibition of Polish artist Robert Kuśmirowski (Łódź, 1973), curated by Marinella Paderni and Lorenzo Balbi. Titled PERSO[A]NOMALIA, the show investigates memory and loss, marking the 44th anniversary of the Ustica massacre, an airplane crash that killed 81 people in the Tyrrhenian Sea. The exhibition opens with the acrid smell of burning books, setting a hermetic and unsettling atmosphere where space and time dissolve between collective memory and personal imagination. Kuśmirowski's practice centers on temporal paradoxes, reconstructing historical environments and valorizing objects tied to past stories. Works include Luft Hansa (2017), a meticulous reconstruction of the German airline's ticket office with period furnishings, and Cosmorama (2010), where viewers look through binoculars at short films of the artist reviving forgotten trades. Central to the show is Portier (2024), which strips objects of their auratic value, allowing viewers to recognize familiar elements from their own lives. The Piano (2024), evoked by a melody in the first room, offers a nostalgic refuge. The exhibition reinterprets abandoned, dust-covered objects, liberating them from banality and oblivion, blurring reality and fiction. This cultural rehabilitation restores dignity to objects and fosters renewed understanding of history and human experience.