Sarenco retrospective at CAMeC La Spezia explores total art and poetry

The CAMeC in La Spezia presents a major retrospective of Sarenco (Isaia Mabellini, 1945–2017), an eclectic Italian artist, poet, performer, photographer, filmmaker, and publisher. Curated by Giosuè Allegrini, an admiral turned cultural official, with Oriano Mabellini of the Fondazione Sarenco in Salò, the show features nearly 200 works spanning five decades. Sarenco participated in four Venice Biennales (1972, 1986, 2001 with a solo room, 2011) and Documenta 5 in Kassel (1972). The exhibition is organized into thematic rooms: concrete poetry and word-image works (including a photographic diptych with Joseph Beuys), ironic reworkings of Giorgio Morandi still lifes and Francisco Goya's The Third of May 1808, an installation titled Let's go to school with 14 stations of a symbolic Via Crucis, and a section dedicated to Africa, reflecting his organization of four editions of the Biennale Internazionale d'Arte di Malindi in Kenya (2006–2012). Notable works include the portal sculpture Gedicht macht frei (2002), declaring 'poetry makes free,' and the installation Il poeta è nudo, inviting visitors to donate money. The show emphasizes Sarenco's concept of Gesamtkunstwerk and poetry as a foundational, liberating force.