MALNA TURAN at the Girifalco Fortress of Cortona
Contemporary archetypes

Scarica il CATALOGO con le IMMAGINI di Malna Turan (file pdf)

Download the English version of the CATALOGUE (text only) (pdf file)

Friday, 3 July 2009 at 18.00, at the Girifalco Fortress in Cortona, has been inaugurated the display by Valerio Giovannini entitled “Malna Turan. Contemporary Archetypes“ The exhibition features approximately sixty works inspired by the suggestion to rediscover, re-read and propose aesthetical, cultural and symbolic messages and values of the Etruscan civilization with figurative and allegorical language of contemporary culture.

Through highly artistic, conceptual and communicative works with which he weaves with sensitivity and irony the dimensions of time and space, Valerio Giovannini shows us the faces, thoughts and stories of people (the Etruscan word is phersu), ideas and characters from the Etruscan age who narrate, quote us and mirror us as contemporaries. Giovannini has come to this exhibition through a long and challenging path of study and semiotic research on the extraordinary wealth of knowledge and culture guarded and loved in the town of Cortona.
Better than in any other place, in Cortona we discover that the ancient knowledge is the mirror image of the present: it enriches its meaning and helps us to be more aware of our life, including it in the ancient history of the world. Indeed, as written by Franco Cardini “we are older than what we believe” and without the re-visitation of the most ancient roots and values we cannot understand cultures and communities of today.

The title of the exhibition Malna Turan is composed of two Etruscan words and can be translated as “Mirror of the Goddess of Love”, the ancient deity to which the Etruscans had consecrated the month of July.

Technical design and dimensions of the works refer to the proportions of the Tabula Cortonensis and to typical Etruscan materials: gold, copper, linen, terracotta and pigments. Giovannini  in his personal recherche, devotes much attention to the materials with which “make work”. He uses the technique of à plat, of stylisation, of geometrication to create icon-images, shared codes of communication, as noted by art scholar Marilena Pasquali. The striking architecture of the wings, the rooms and halls of the Girifalco Fortress, along with views of the Valdichiana and the Lake of Bolsena, which we are able to view from the ramparts, remind us of the Etruscan arx. Thanks to the artistic cycles designed by Giovannini we can also re-live the strong daily topicality of the culture of the Etruscans, who, among other things, were “certainly more lighthearted than the Latins, more libertarian in everything and for everybody” as Philippe Daverio wrote recently.

The exhibition, which is part of the regional program of “The Nights of Archaeology” is sponsored by the Municipality of Cortona, MAEC (Museo dell’Accademia Etrusca e della città di Cortona), Amat (Association of Archaeological Museums in Tuscany) and by the cultural association Present Art and has the patronage of Regione Toscana, Provincia di Arezzo, Comune di Cortona, MAEC, Amat, Accademia Etrusca, Archeologia Viva and Parusia.

This is the program for the opening Friday, 3 July:
- 18.00 Participation by Andrea Vignini, Mayor of Cortona, Ambra Giorgi, President of Amat, Paolo Giulierini, Curator MAEC. The author will also be present.
- 18.45  Guided tour of the exhibition
- 19:45  Aperitif

Participants at the opening will be offered a free copy of the catalogue, published by the Municipality of Cortona.
The exhibition will remain open until 26 July 2009 daily from 10.00 to 13.00 and from 14.00 to 19.00.
Info: www.presentart.it    www.cortonamaec.org    www.valeriogiovannini.com