Rome

D'ARC Foundation, a new space for art

Collectors Giovanni Floridi and Clara Datti set up their foundation in a suburban area of the capital to regenerate the area. Great space for Italian authors

by Nicola Zanella

2 November 2024

La Fondazione D’ARC, all’esterno. ph Eleonora Cerri Pecorella

3' min read

Key points

Where to look for the work
Notary Collectors

3' min read

Last weekend the Fondazione D'ARC of Giovanni Floridi and Clara Datti opened in Rome. The new centre for contemporary art has found its home in a former industrial warehouse beautifully renovated by 3C+t Capolei Cavalli associate architects and is located not far from the Tiburtina station, away from the Renaissance palaces and Roman ruins.

An unusual location for the capital where everything happens within the Ztl zone, but the D'ARC Foundation likes to amaze by showing, in many choices, independence of thought, a certain originality and showing in its desire to regenerate a suburban area its more contemporary side.

I grandi spazi industriali della Fondazione accolgono una scultura di Eva Jospin in dialogo con una scultura di Giorgio Andreotta Calò. ph Eleonora Cerri Pecorella

Clara Datti and Giovanni Floridi are a well-known couple on the Italian scene, but at the same time aloof and independent, no obsession to appear at all costs and no anxiety to follow the fashions that have followed over the decades. They started collecting contemporary art almost 30 years ago, the first work they bought was a view of Venice by Fabio Aguzzi: you never forget your first love but perhaps a little bit you disown it and so it is confined to the private sphere, in the bedroom. Far more significant is the second child, an abstract painting byEmilio Scanavino, acquired for 10 million lire in the early 2000s. In addition to international names such as Anselm Kiefer, Joseph Kosuth, Tomas Saraceno, Eva Jospin and Nathlie Provosty, an intergenerational dialogue dedicated to Italian artists finds a large space in the Foundation, and in addition to a mirror by Michelangelo Pistoletto and a bronze by Arnaldo Pomodoro there are works by Arcangelo Sassolino, Chiara Camoni, Giulia Cenci, Loris Cecchini, Giorgio Andreotta Calò as well as many others. Among the masterpieces that have marked their path, "the only painting we went into debt for," they say laughing, is a painting by Giacomo Balla bought at auction.

Due capolavori: la scultura di Anselm Kiefer in dialogo con il Neon di Joseph Kosuth. Ph Eleonora Cerri Pecorella alla Fondazione D’Arc

Where to look for the work

The sources of supply are varied: auction houses indeed, galleries or from other collectors. Just as there are no limits of medium: paintings, installations, sculptures and videos coexist in the space. The latest work to arrive in the collection is a painting by Susanna Inglada purchased at the Maurits Van de Laar gallery in Amsterdam for 10,000 euros, underlining a trend in the collection that in recent years has been acquiring mainly works by female artists.

The collection is curated by Giuliana Benassi and, once the labours of the start-up have been overcome, in the coming months the Foundation will be the hub of various initiatives: a residency dedicated to international artists will welcome the first guest in 2025 but, above all, the most original choice is that of dedicating part of the space to a "focus Italia" to give a voice to Italian creatives who are often mistreated even by our own institutions, in the hope of acting as a driving force for their careers.

Installation view della Fondazione D’ARC, si vede anche l’ultima opera entrata in collezione «Crowd X», 2020 dell’artista spagnola Susanna Inglada. Ph Eleonora Cerri Pecorella

The D'ARC Foundation therefore wants to have an impact, both on its own neighbourhood and on the careers of young artists, eschewing the idea of being a mere monument to those who created it.

Notary Collectors

On the same weekend as the inauguration in Rome there was the national convention of notaries, a professional category to which Giovanni Floridi belongs and which has given the art market many protagonists, what the correlation (apart from income) is between deeds of inheritance and collecting is not clear, but it is certainly very fertile. Also in Rome, but this time in the Testaccio district, is the Giuliani Foundation of the notary Giovanni Giuliani, which opens Mary Obering's solo exhibition "Outside and Inside" on 6 November. Another one of the most significant art collections of our century belongs to the notary Vittorio Gaddi and can also be found in his studio in Lucca. In Catanzaro, the studio of the notary Gianluca Perrella is an outpost of contemporary art in a region that is poor in initiatives in this direction; among the young collectors (and notaries), the name of Giampiero Pondrano d'Altavilla, better known on instagram by the pseudonym Inartenotaio, is on the rise.