Until 28 February 2018, the MA*GA Museum in Gallarate hosts the XXIII edition of HUMOR A GALLARATE – INTERNATIONAL CARTOON CONTEST, the event every year brings together the best cartoonists, illustrators, humorists and caricaturists from all over the world.
The chosen theme – On the road – is a tribute to Jack Kerouac, protagonist of the exhibition underway at MA*GA until April 22, 2018.
The initiative presents the exhibition of 120 cartoons – divided into three areas satire, graphic, caricature -, chosen among the 1200 works in the competition by 399 authors, selected by the jury composed of Antonio Antunes (cartoonist) Sandrina Bandera (president of the MA*GA Museum), Vincenzo Coronetti (journalist), Gian Lorenzo Ingrami (cartoonist), Marzio Mariani (cartoonist ), Marilena Nardi (cartoonist), Mariarosa Todeschin (director Pro Loco Gallarate).
The MA*GA also hosts the personal exhibition of Marilena Nardi (Chiampo, VI, 1966), winner of the Marco Biassoni Grand Prix in 2017, which offers thirty of her best-known works.
From 1984 to today, Marilena Nardi has participated in more than a hundred graphic humor and illustration exhibitions and reviews in Italy and around the world. There are also numerous prizes and awards that have been awarded to her. Some of her works are kept in the humorous graphics museums of Bajardo, Bronzolo, Tolentino, Istanbul, Tehran, Zemun and at the Museum of Science and Technology in Milan.
Marilena Nardi has been part of some juries, such as the VIII National Review of the Humor Cartoons "Premio Saverio Memmo" of Lanciano in 2000, the I International Biennial of Graphic Humor "Wine, humor and ... fantasy" and the IX International Humor Festival Chart in 2006 and the 2nd International Cartoon Contest Olive in Cyprus in 2009.
Many collaborations with national newspapers and periodicals, among which those for Il Fatto Quotidiano, for Corriere della Sera (ViviMilano, CorrierEconomia, CorriereSoldi, CorriereLavoro, CorriereScuola) but also Diario, Gente Money, Borsa & Finanza, Avvenimenti, Salute Natural, Our Budget, Monthly, and more.
As stated by the president of the Pro Loco Gallarate, Vittorio Pizzolato, “The decision to borrow the title of perhaps the best known work by Kerouac, above all by the Italian public, was primarily a cause for reflection for us. On the road it is an expression entered into common language, we have all used it at least once, with the most disparate meanings. For many cartoonist be On the road it often means having to defend one's freedom of the press, defend one's ideas and one's way of understanding satire from the pages of the press or from their blogs”.
“The charm of graphic humor – continues Vittorio Pizzolato – consists precisely in this incredible ability to condense even complex thoughts and meanings and make them easy to interpret for everyone. Because deep down we all sometimes smile when we see a cartoon in a newspaper, or when we discover an illustration that explains a complex concept in just a few strokes!”.
For their part, Sandrina Bandera, Alessandro Castiglioni and Emma Zanella, curators of the exhibition Jack Kerouac. Beat painting, declared that “the exhibition which presents for the first time an unpublished fund of graphic and pictorial works by one of the greatest authors of world literature of the XNUMXth century, does not only investigate the visual languages experimented by Kerouac and the relationships between pictorial practice and literary but, more generally, questions the topicality of Kerouac's legacy and cultural contribution”.
"For this reason - the curators continue - alongside the exhibition, the museum has conceived the project "My Kerouac" which forms part of the XXIII Edition of Humor in Gallarate which presents itself as a vast investigation into what Kerouac's work has shaped and influenced contemporary culture, also as regards, in this case, graphics and illustration”.
Humor in Gallarate Marco Biassoni Grand Prix – was officially born in 1995. Growing up in this city, the event has become one of the most important in the panorama of humor and satirical graphics. An eye wide open on a form of communication that on the one hand is a source of entertainment, on the other it becomes in some cases a moment of critical reflection on society.
Il Marco Biassoni Grand Prix it is a cultural event which, in addition to celebrating the city of Gallarate, honors a pure and direct artistic form, capable of overcoming cultural differences and making people with even very distant origins communicate. Dialoguing through images, sometimes without the need for words, different cultures can meet, enter into relationships, get to know each other and make their own peculiarities and those of their respective territories known.
Image: Istva n Kelemen, Hungary
