The Igor Mitoraj Museum inaugurated in Pietrasanta

Museo Mitoraj is supported by the Igor Mitoraj Museum Foundation created by the Ministry of Culture, the Tuscany Region and the Municipality of Pietrasanta thanks to the generous donation of 69 works by the sculptor by Jean-Paul Sabatié, the artist’s heir and current president of the Foundation. Directed by Frank Boehm, architect and curator, the museum has the ambition of consolidating the dialogue between Mitoraj’s work, the territory of Pietrasanta and the international context, promoting and enhancing the artist’s work in the institutional context and inviting international contemporary sculptors to Pietrasanta. For this reason, Frank Boehm, former director of the Museum Insel Hombroich (Düsseldorf), brings to Pietrasanta consolidated experience in working between museum and territory, work and space, with special attention to collaboration between artists and artisans.

Sculptures in marble, bronze and resin, as well as extraordinary jewels, are masterfully installed in a symbolic place: the building where the city’s municipal market was housed until ten years ago. Modernist architecture designed by Tito Salvatori in 1968, today the space is reactivated thanks to the redevelopment project of the OBR architecture studio of Paolo Brescia and Tommaso Principi, known for important interventions on exhibition spaces. OBR transformed the former market into a transparent environment, where natural light filters through the entirely glass perimeter walls. Here the quality of the light is atmospheric and enveloping during the day, while at night the museum transforms into a sort of urban lantern that spreads the light of the sophisticated lighting system outside. Thus rethought, today the Mitoraj Museum represents a new urban polarity between the railway station and the center of Pietrasanta. The entrance overlooking via Oberdan is a green public square where two symbolic elements have been installed: Corazza, the monumental bronze sculpture by Mitoraj, and a large centuries-old olive tree, one of the artist’s favorite trees.

The exhibition “Mitoraj, Present” presents for the first time the donation in which some of the artist’s most significant works stand out, such as Bocca della rocca bianca. Created in 1985, the sculpture in white Apuan marble, which weighs almost half a quintal, distills the poetics of the Master who investigates the tension between the perfection of classical aesthetics and the idea of ​​contemporary decadence and ruin. That tension that characterizes both monumental and tiny works such as Torso bijoux, (1977), a small gilded silver jewel with a fragment of a classical torso. Installed in this atmospheric space, the works are placed on dark gray wooden plinths and glass cases. In the installation designed by Boehm himself, the works have a powerful and intriguing impact, made even clearer by white wings and a large plinth on which the sketch of the great Centaur Fountain stands out.

“Mitoraj. Present” is also the first event of an international contemporary art program dedicated to sculpture. The museum has, by statute, the dual objective of studying and enhancing the work of Igor Mitoraj, and of promoting and producing contemporary art exhibitions and projects. The two objectives align around the idea of ​​sculpture, artistic and artisanal production, in one of the most interesting and special territories in Europe for the processing of marble and bronze. It is from this perspective that next spring’s exhibition Figura, dedicated to international contemporary sculpture, has already been announced.

“The role of the Mitoraj Museum is to enhance, support and promote contemporary sculpture by opening a dialogue between art, craftsmanship and landscape. The work on Mitoraj is an inspiration and a tribute to a great artist and is the beginning of an international research journey that will involve contemporary artists and sculptors”, explains director Frank Boehm who is working on a busy calendar of exhibitions, meetings, initiatives and public programs.

“We inaugurate a great enterprise, the result of a history in which love for art, the profound identity of Pietrasanta and an exemplary model of urban regeneration are intertwined. We celebrate the opening to the public of a new museum center dedicated to Igor Mitoraj, master of an unmistakable figurative language and protagonist of one of the most original artistic researches of the second half of the twentieth century. A construction site of creative production and center of social aggregation, to which the Ministry of Culture has allocated significant resources in the context of ‘Major Cultural Heritage Projects'”, declared the Minister of Culture, Alessandro Giuli.

“The opening of the Mitoraj Museum represents a moment of extraordinary importance for Tuscany and for Pietrasanta, a city that for decades has been an international point of reference for sculpture and for the dialogue between art, creativity and artisan know-how. This museum was born thanks to a precious synergy between institutions and the generous donation of the artist’s works, and delivers to the future a cultural heritage of universal value. Mitoraj found his artistic and human home in Pietrasanta, intertwining his own talent with the mastery of our workshops and our foundries. Today this bond becomes a permanent institution capable of preserving the memory of a great master and, at the same time, opening up to contemporary research and international comparison. It is a cultural investment that strengthens the identity of Tuscany as a land of art, beauty and innovation”, stated the president of the Tuscany Region, Eugenio Giani.

“The Mitoraj Museum is much more than an exhibition space: it is a lively place of meeting, cultural production and dialogue between generations, languages and skills. Its birth gives back to the community a symbolic place of the city, transforming it into a center dedicated to contemporary sculpture and the valorisation of one of the most significant artistic figures of our time. It is particularly important that this project was born in Pietrasanta, where art, craftsmanship and business have always coexisted in a unique balance. The museum collects the legacy of Igor Mitoraj and projects it in the future, creating new opportunities for cultural growth, international attraction and participation. Tuscany thus continues to invest in a culture capable of generating knowledge, development and new relationships between the territories and the world”, declared the Councilor for Culture of the Tuscany Region, Cristina Manetti.

The mayor of Pietrasanta, Alberto Stefano Giovannetti, said: “Today, handing over this place to the community of Pietrasanta, to the visitors who will arrive from all over the world and to future generations is not only a moment of celebration but the completion of a long and complex journey that has required time, determination and solid institutional synergy. For this reason, I want to extend, on behalf of the city, my most sincere ‘thank you’ to the Ministry of Culture, from the then owner Dario Franceschini, then Gennaro Sangiuliano to Alessandro Giuli; to the Tuscany Region; to the Mitoraj Foundation and to all those who laid a brick to get here: the designers, the workers and the staff of the municipal offices. There is a profound affinity between Mitoraj’s vision of art and our city. naturally comes out into the street. This is why this will not be a museum in the traditional sense of the term but a natural extension of our streets and squares, a living space that will combine the immortal genius of Mitoraj with the history, identity and future of Pietrasanta.”

“I had the pleasure and honor of personally meeting Igor in Pietrasanta. His museum could only be a museum that is always alive and experienced. We imagined it together with the President Jean-Paul Sabatié and the Director Frank Boehm as an art center, in which contemplation and exchange will bring together new urban and artistic energies. It is the idea of ​​a museum that comes out of itself, beyond itself”, said the architect Paolo Brescia.

The new museum, supported by the Foundation, benefits from the precious support of the Friends of the Museum Association, chaired by Rosaria Sommariva. The project was born from a strong bond with the Foundation and involves a community of collectors and contemporary art enthusiasts who directly participate in the growth of the Museum. The members of the Association have dedicated access to the museum on exchange occasions, with a concrete role in consolidating the museum as an authoritative cultural hub and a lively platform for dialogue. The entrusting of the brand identity and graphic image to Studio Pupilla, one of the most interesting multidisciplinary realities for graphic design, underlines the importance of communicating the entire project.