Krampus, Vienna in the early twentieth century, the mountains of Friuli: on display at Palazzo Veneziano in Malborghetto
Malborghetto Ud 11 December 2021 – The well-known Krampus in the most beautiful images; the journey through the mountains of Friuli in winter told with artist’s brushstrokes; a fairytale world in early twentieth century Vienna revived for young and old through the 34 volumes illustrated by the great protagonists of the European artistic movements of the time, which thus accompanied the fables selected by Hans Fraungruber.
These are the captivating artistic-cultural proposals that throughout the month of December and until 9 January invite Malborghetto, in the spectacular setting of Palazzo Veneziano, itself an architectural beauty and a treasure chest to be discovered as it is the seat of the Ethnographic Museum.
A plurality of notably different proposals from each other and therefore capable of attracting the most diverse spirits, for a journey that begins here and then can continue to discover the peculiarities of the territory in a sparkling winter landscape.
The Krampus are the protagonists of the first stage proposed inside the Palazzo, in an excursus intended as “Metamorphosis of a ritual mask between two centuries”, the twentieth century and the two thousand. The photography of these surprising masks highlights their artistry, thanks to the skilful shots of Roberto Bati who, between 2014 and 2017, went from town to town along the Valcanale, to capture the “artistic product” they represent. . A perhaps unusual reading of these objects, compared to the consolidated anthropological and ethnographic one, but extremely appropriate, as demonstrated by the rest of the photographic journey in which the Krampus live through the photographs from the photographic archive of Palazzo Veneziano, between the 1960s and the early 90s of the twentieth century. From the photo gallery, in fact, the amazing change in style emerges, which has led the mask to be a real artistic artefact, as well as a mirror reflecting the historical period and the social context in which it is produced. Furthermore, the artistic tension that is breathed in each photograph, individually from the time, also testifies to the vivacity and passion with which each generation interprets this ancient tradition in a new way.
The protagonist of the second proposal that one encounters climbing the floors of Palazzo Malborghetto is the art of Pietro Nicolaucich, in «Epiphenomenon atmospheric». Illustrations and poems compose an artistic project that develops in 9 large acrylics on canvas, coupled with verses taken from the short illustrated poem published in 2018, to which are added two acrylics and an installation created on the wave of the same inspiration. The exhibition arrived in the artist’s country of origin after being exhibited at the Cattina Spazio Contemporaneo for Vogue For Milan, at the Studio Prisma in Genoa and at the Friuli Art and Comic Building in Pordenone. «It all started with an epiphany, an image that was formed in front of my eyes while I was walking in the mountains – says the artist -. It was a cloudy day and the sky was so pale that it merged with the snow (…) This single canvas soon turned into a series ».
Until 9 January it will be a party to arrive in Malborghetto even for the little ones, accompanied by adults, to immerse themselves in the written and figurative stories proposed by the exhibition “The most beautiful fairy tales for young and old readers”, curated by Marina Bressan and Roberta Calvo for dare, through art, an additional educational opportunity. In the 34 volumes that contain the well-known and lesser-known fables selected by the master Fraungruber (1863-1993), the drawings of the great European artists of the early twentieth century are perfectly integrated with the text according to the principle of Gesamtkunstwerk, the total work of art.