Mirella BENTIVOGLIO
(Klagenfurt, 1922 - Roma, 2017)
Born in 1922 in Klagenfurt (Austria), Mirella Bentivoglio first began writing books of poetry. She was raised trilingual by her Italian parents in Switzerland.
She then explored the connection between language and image, joining the Concrete and Visual Poetry movements.
In the 1960s she moved to a personal form of object-poetry and during the 1970s, she gradually expanded her work to performance, action-poetry and environment-poetry.
Bentivoglio staged solo exhibitions in museums and galleries such as Palazzo delle Esposizioni, Rome (1996), National Museum of Women in the Arts, Washington DC (1999), Oculus Gallery in Tokyo (2010), Pomona College in Claremont, CA (2003 and 2015). Other notable exhibitions took place at Studio Eos in Rome (2013), Galleria dell’Elefante in Treviso (2015) and in the MACMA exhibition spaces in Matino, Lecce (2011 to 2013).
During her career, she kept contacts with other artists mainly by correspondence, for example: Amelia Etlinger, Betty Danon, Gisela Frankenberg*.
She took part to group shows in museums and galleries in Europe, America, the Middle and Far East, Canada and Australia. She exhibited several times at the Venice Biennale (in 1969, 1972, 1978, 1980, 1986, 1995, with a performance in 2001 and finally, in 2009). She showed at Brazil’s São Paulo Art Biennial three times between 1973 and 1994, and at the Pompidou Centre in Paris three times between 1978 and 1982. She also showed at Documenta, Kassel (1982), at MoMA, NYC (1992), at Palazzo Pitti, Florence (2001) and at the Milan Expo (2015).
Alongside her artistic activity, Mirella Bentivoglio was very engaged in the critic scenario: as a curator specialized in the verbovisive sector. In many of these exhibitions there were many of her own pieces.
Thanks to her commitment as a curator she promoted female artists: in the 70s she began to involve fellow female artists into group exhibitions. These exhibitions later became very important for gender theories, for example in the review curated by Bentivoglio in 1978 “Materializzazione del linguaggio” at the Venice Biennal – where it was exhibited also some of Amelia Etlinger’s work.
Her installations and large structures in stone or wood can be found in the permanent collections of numerous museums, including MACRO in Rome, Ca’ Pesaro in Venice, the National Museum of Women in the Arts, Washington DC; the Getty Institute, Los Angeles; MoMA, NYC; MART, Rovereto; MAC, São Paulo, Brazil; the Uffizi Galleries and the National Central Library, Florence.
Mirella Bentivoglio died in 2017.
SOLO EXHIBITIONS
2022
L'altra faccia della luna, Istituto Italiano di Cultura e Galleria Gramma Epsilon, Atene (EL)
2021
L'altra faccia della luna, Museo Stazione dell’Arte, Ex Stazione ferroviaria, Ulassai (Nu)
2020
Sculture, Galleria Conceptual, Milano
2019
Je suis, Museo Pietro Cavoti, Galatina
Lapide a Hravat (1995-1998), nell'ambito di Omaggi alle artiste, Galleria d'Arte Moderna di Roma Capitale
Oltre la parola. Mirella Bentivoglio dalla collezione Garrera, La Sapienza - Museo Laboratorio di Arte Contemporanea, Roma
Mirella Bentivoglio. Creazione e fine, Galleria Conceptual, Milano
2018
Mirella Bentivoglio, Galleria dell'Incisione, Brescia
2015
Mirella Bentivoglio, Galleria l'Elefante, Treviso
1999
National Museum of Women in the Arts, Washington, DC
The visual poetry of Mirella Bentivoglio, The National Museum of Women in the Arts, New York
The visual poetry of Mirella Bentivoglio, Italian Cultural Institute, Washington
1996
Mirella Bentivoglio dalla parola al simbolo, Palazzo delle Esposizioni, Roma
1991
Art Center, Edewecht
1988
Writers' Forum, Londra
1987
Torre del Lebbroso, Aosta
1984
Mirella Bentivoglio. Simbolo come struttura, Gubbio
Pinacoteca Comunale, Macerata
1983
Mirella Bentivoglio. Pietra filosofale, Galleria Il Segno, Torino
1982
Metronom, Barcellona
Arte Duchamp, Roma
1981
Centro Il Brandale, Roma
1980
Istituto Italiano di Cultura, New York
1979
Cooperativa Alzaia, Roma
Spazio Alternativo, Roma
Casa Italiana, Nazareth College, Rochester
1978
Spazio Alernativo, Roma
1977
Italian House di Rochester, New York
Poetry Collection, Università di Buffalo
1976
Centro Il Brandale, Savona
1975
Bentivoglio, Studio Santandrea, Milano
1974
Le referenze bivalenti di Mirella Bentivoglio, Centrosei, Bari
Studio Artivisive, Matera
Klingspor Museum, Offenbach/Main
GROUP EXHIBITIONS
2022
Flying Words, Osart Gallery, Milan
Umano troppo umano: l’agone atletico dagli altari alla polvere, Villa d’Este a Tivoli, Italyolvere, Villa d’Este a Tivoli, Italy
2021
Rebel Archives, Mendes Wood DM, Vigliano Biellese
Terra Sacra, Mole Vanvitelliana, Ancona
The Poetry of Translation, Kunst Meran, Merano
Histoire d'E. Between language and image, Roma, Spazio indipendente Lettera_E, Atene, Gramma_Epsilon
2020
Libertà sulla parola, Osart Gallery, Milano
La poesia visiva come arte multisensoriale, Fondazione Berardelli, Brescia
2019
L'altra faccia della luna, Studio Tiepolo, Roma
Intermedia. Archivio di Nuova scrittura, Museion, Bolzano, Mart, Rovereto
Un mare di Parole, Mancaspazio, Nuoro
Volumina Atto Secondo. Le artiste e il libro, Museo Nori de' Nobili, Trecastelli
Doing Deculturalization, Museion, Bolzano
The Unexpected Subject. 1978 Art and Feminism in Italy, c. by Marco Scotini, Raffaella Perna, FM Centre for Contemporary Art, Milano
Eva vs Eva. La duplice valenza del femminile nell'immaginario occidentale, Villa d'Este, Tivoli
2018
Body and Words in Italian and Lithuanian Women's Art from 1965 to the Present, c. by Benedetta Carpi de Resmini, Laima Kreivyte, Magma, Vilnius, Roma
2011
Poesia visiva. La donazione di Mirella Bentivoglio al MART, Rovereto
2001
(S)cripturae. Le scritture segrete: artiste tra linguaggio e immagine, Padova
1995
Biennale di Venezia
1994
Biennale di San Paolo
Peggy Guggenheim Collection, Venezia
1988
Volumina: il libro oggetto rivisitato dalla donna artista del nostro secolo, Senigallia
Post scriptum. Artiste italiane tra linguaggio e immagine negli anni Sessanta e Settanta, Ferrara
1986
G. Montana, L'inattuale pittorico n°51 , XXI Premio Vasto di arte e critica d'arte.
Biennale di Venezia
XI Quadriennale di Roma