The exhibition, hosted in Mantua from 13 July to 3 November. proposes a historical and artistic itinerary among the symbolic and archetypal aspects of the myth of Cupid and Psyche, through the juxtaposition of archaeological finds from Magna Graecia and the Roman imperial age with classical and contemporary works: from Tintoretto to Canova, from Auguste Rodin to Fabrizio Plessi, from Salvador Dalì to Alfredo Pirri. An itinerary that ideally opens with "Cupid and Psyche", the masterpiece by Giulio Romano preserved in the Gonzaga residence.
The story tells the story of Psyche, a mortal of equal beauty to Venus, who becomes the bride of Love without ever being able to see her face. One night, instigated by her envious sisters, she manages to discover his face but she is immediately abandoned by the god. Her psyche will therefore have to face a series of tests, at the end of which she will obtain immortality and she will be able to reunite with her husband.
The exhibition – curated by Elena Fontanella, organized by the DNArt Foundation, promoted by the Department of Cultural Policies and Tourism Promotion of the Municipality of Mantua – presents archaeological finds from Magna Graecia and the Roman imperial age of the XNUMXth and XNUMXth centuries BC, from from the Capitoline Museums of Rome, the National Archaeological Museum of Reggio Calabria and other important public institutions. They are combined with classic works of art (statues and paintings by masters such as Tintoretto, Antonio Canova, Auguste Rodin, Salvador Dalì, Tamara de Lempicka and others) to finally reach the contemporary with the installations by Fabrizio Plessi, set up in the Sala dei Giganti , and by Alfredo Pirri. The latter for the occasion he made Passi, a work that, on the floor of the Chamber of Cupid and Psyche, sees a large mirroring surface placed able to reflect the ceiling, at the center of which is placed the Italian Venus by Antonio Canova.
Love and Psyche. The Tale of the Soul is based on the interpretation of the myth in a Neoplatonic key that was given in Humanism, for which Psyche's error consists in considering the divine as a tangible and verifiable reality with the senses, while it is only the heart that can fully perceive its presence. “Current life – declares the curator of the exhibition Elena Fontanella – often denies man the spaces of the sacred. Chaotically overwhelmed by existence, we are unprepared to face the immense inner crossings, made up of voids and silences, that life puts before us. Thanks to the help of one of the most beautiful tales about love, death and life, we want to accompany the visitor on these paths of the soul, using the artistic images which, over the millennia, have been inspired by this story”.
There are two sections; the first, al temple of San Sebastiano, built on a project by Leon Battista Alberti, houses the one dedicated entirely to archeology.
That a Palazzo Te follows the different stages of Apuleius' story - from passion to serenity achieved through hope - and ideally opens from the Chamber of Cupid and Psyche, a masterpiece frescoed by Giulio Romano conserved in the Gonzaga residence.
The story and the exhibition both start from the rivalry in the name of beauty. Psyche, the new earthly Aphrodite, unknowingly creates a subversion of the cosmic order which seriously jeopardizes the very harmony of the ancient rules of the world of the gods. On the other hand, Aphrodite – goddess of beauty and love, who presides over the fertility of the cosmos on which the creative power of Eros acts – is indignant at the human pride of a mortal who wants to compete with her charms. In this first area, works of great importance are compared, such as the Venus from the Capitoline Museums, the Italian Venus (1807-1808) by Antonio Canova e Venus (1528) of Palma the Elder.
We then continue with the theme of Psyche's feral wedding, prologue to the drama that is about to unfold. In fact, a prophecy sees Psyche married to a monster; precisely for this reason, Eros orders Zefiro to kidnap her to take her to her palace where, with the help of the night and the dark, he will be able to meet her beloved. Psyche, happy in her new home, nevertheless suffers the envy of her sisters – a symbol of female conscience, or rather of the inner voice that determines the evolution necessary to implement the overcoming of simple passionate love – who suggest she kill her beloved.
Psyche, in what represents the oldest model of sacrificial act, waits for Eros to have fallen asleep to lift the lamp over him and see his animal aspect: a drop of boiling oil, however, hits his stretched out body, making him jump and flee . While Psyche, with illumination, determines the knowledge of her love, Eros finds himself being overwhelmed by the all-encompassing love of the woman, which imposes not the darkness of the unconscious but the luminosity of conscience and awareness, creating a path that it also inevitably leads to grief and separation.
Archetype of the man-woman relationship, this scene is represented by works such as Sleeping Eros (a marble from the early imperial age, from a Hellenistic original from the Capitoline Museums), Funerary bed from Amiternum, (bronze and silver from the end of the XNUMXst century BC – beginning of the XNUMXst century AD, from the National Archaeological Museum of Abruzzo in Chieti), Psyche discovers Cupid (XNUMXth century) by the Candlelight Master, from the Galleria Borghese in Rome.
Deprived of her lover, Psyche falls into the deepest despair and gives herself up to Aphrodite, hoping to appease her wrath. The goddess decides to submit her to a series of four tests, the last of which involves going down to her underworld to ask Persephone for her elixir of perennial youth. It will be a tower, symbol of human knowledge, to help her in this enterprise; on the way back, however, her curiosity again wins the girl who, inhaling her fluid, falls into a deep sleep similar to death. This section houses one of the splendid pinakes (small terracotta votive pictures from the first half of the XNUMXth century BC) from the excavations of the Sanctuary of Persephone in Locri, depicting the offering of the ball to Persephone.
Only Eros, who had never resigned himself to living without Psyche, will be able to awaken his beloved with his amorous arrows, ensuring the story a happy ending and the tender embrace depicted in many famous sculptural groups, such as the plaster cast by Pietro Tenerani psyche fainted, of 1822.
Love and Psyche standing (C.1810), plaster masterpiece by Antonio Canova, testifies to the compassion of Zeus who will grant the two lovers to unite in immortality.
The myth thus brings to light an epochal turning point in the development of ancient religiosity and the conception of the soul: the ability to love is a divine spark, and the transformation of the soul through love is a mystery that brings us closer to God.
LOVE AND PSYCHE. The Tale of the Soul
Mantua, Palazzo Te and San Sebastiano
13 July - 3 November 2013
