One artwork becomes fifty originals thanks to the Salerno print production chain
The Menna Foundation and PrintLitoArt are launching “Singolare/Plurale”, featuring four artists from different generations and certified print runs
A single artwork, fifty originals. The art multiples project by Fondazione Menna and PrintLitoArt will be called “Singolare/Plurale”. Each year, a shortlist of artists will be selected: they will create a work (the Singular), which will be reproduced in fifty certified editions, each numbered and signed by the artists (the Plural).
“This agreement marks a new chapter in the promotion of contemporary art, opening the doors to new talent and unprecedented forms of expression.” So explains Letizia Magaldi, president of the Filiberto and Bianca Menna Foundation – Centre for Contemporary Art Studies. In the age of technical reproducibility, the work of art is thus reproduced right from the outset, with the aim of transforming and broadening its audience: “This project will enable us to reach a wider audience, whilst at the same time showcasing Italian creativity and the intellectual legacy that our Foundation safeguards.”
The Past and Future of Art
The Foundation’s cultural legacy and involvement made it possible to select the four artists for the first edition: the established artists Tomaso Binga and Enrico Pulsoni, and the emerging artists Irene Macalli and Michela Rondinone. Binga is the male stage name of Bianca Pucciarelli Menna, a sound poet and performance artist born in Salerno in 1931. Rounding out the line-up are Pulsoni, an artist and set designer born in 1956, whose work is already part of the Foundation’s collection, and two artists from the new generation, both born in 1999, who bring themes related to places, memory and materials to the project. Stefania Zuliani, the Foundation’s artistic director, emphasises her ‘feminine choices’, with the aim of continuing the sensibility of the Menna couple, whose collection ‘features some of the most significant female artists of 20th-century Italian art’.
The Southern Supply Chain
The artists belong to different generations but are all linked by their experimental approach and have all been trained in the art academies and regions of Southern Italy.This selection thus allows “Singolare/Plurale” to be interpreted as a small cultural network of the South. The Foundation was established between Salerno and Rome, whilst the production capacity and printing technology are provided by PrintLitoArt, a Salerno-based project by Boccia Industria Grafica.
“Our partnership with the Foundation represents a strategic investment in the future of art,” says Carmela D’Amato, Chair of Boccia Industria Grafica: “We are making our expertise and cutting-edge technological resources available to support artists as they establish themselves.”
