La review, edited by Francesca Ghedini at the Scuderie del Quirinale in Rome and entitled “Ovid. Love, myths and other stories” is among the most refined that I can remember, the choice of different languages involves us from the very first rooms and takes us into a world full of beauty. There are 250 works from 80 museums and public institutions, including masterpieces from major museums such as the Archaeological Museum of Naples, the Uffizi in Florence, the National Gallery in London, the Louvre in Paris and precious manuscripts from the library collection of Gout in Germany, the Marciana in Venice or the Royal Library in Copenhagen.
A sort of story of the poet's life and his difficult relationship with the emperor Augustus who exiled him to the shores of the Black Sea, and this is how Sala per Sala, the visitor is welcomed by the dearest themes written by the poet, from perspective of the gaze on female worldtaught by him on the techniques of seduction, to the contrast between the dignified severity of of the principality officials with the bright and sensual figures that animate the verses of the Metamorphoses.
The deities of Pantheon (Venus, Apollo, Diana, Jupiter) become victims of love in the Ovidian world o architects of violent revenge and atrocious punishments, such as in the tragic story of Niobe, daughter of Tantalus, forced to see killed their own children, which is on display represented from sculptures from unor extraordinary recently discovered group of statues.
The charm of the Pompeii frescoes on the walls are in perfect harmony with the ancient texts present. While pictorial works such as Botticelli's "Venus pudica" can only catch the visitor's gaze.
And again, depictions of Ovid's stories by modern artists from the fifteenth to the eighteenth century such as Benvenuto Cellini, Tintoretto, Ribera, Poussin, Batons up to an extraordinary foray into the contemporary withtheinstallation neon by Joseph Kosuth, inspireda to the Ovid texts, which welcomes the incoming visitor.
An important nucleus of the exhibition revolves around the Metamorphosis, celebrate in their capacity of evoke images through words.
A game of mirrors, Between narrated myths e depicted, that takes shape through stucco ed frescoes in area Vesuvius, gems, sculptures and funerary reliefs. Manufactured goods which reproduce the stories of girls loved, abandoned and kidnapped (like Ariadne and Proserpina), of young people with tragic destinies (including meleagro and Icarus) or of tormented love affairs that concthey play with a transformation, the most famous is that of Hermaphrodite, forever immortalized in famous Roman age statue from Palazzo Massimo. Works that demonstrate the expressive power and suggestion that the poet's verses they continued to print over time, up to the present day.
Are to be traced back to the pen of Ovid, common expressions such as: "i can't vlive with you or without you” and “in love wins who flees”.
The exhibition at the Scuderie del Quirinale intends to narrate Ovid's unprecedented universe, in a path of grace, love and poetry that the curator has been able to skilfully create with great grace and knowledge of the subject.
The period of the exhibition also offers a path full of proposals in various places in the city of Rome to involve the public with numerous meetings, readings and insights.
Calendar of institutional events,
> Sunday 21 October 2018, 11.00
Teatro argentina
Ovid. Love, myths and other stories – The idea of a great project, the happiness of words.
Meeting with Francesca Ghedini e Nicholas Gardini
In collaboration with the Teatro di Roma, Teatro Nazionale
Meeting with Francesca Ghedini, curator of the exhibition, and Nicola Gardini, writer and professor of Italian literature at the University of Oxford.
If words form civilization and mark its time, the Latin ones have never stopped echoing in the unconscious of the entire West. Telling the changes of an ancient and abandoned language that has become contemporary and common, the curators Francesca Ghedini and Nicola Gardini explain Ovid. Loves, myths and other stories, the exhibition that reveals the life and imagination of an entire civilization.
Refined interpreter of Greek and Roman myth, Publius Ovidius Naso is certainly among the most illustrious and versatile representatives of the Latin world, but he is also the demiurge of a collective imagination on which the entire Western culture is based.
That is why, on the occasion of the two thousandth anniversary of his death, from the precious written word to the most beautiful figurative arts, the Scuderie del Quirinale want to remember a living and imaginative Ovid by telling the Rome of his time: its society, its power, its gods, his loves, his myths.
After two thousand years, Ovid's words are still with us, within us.
> Thursday 15 November 2018, 18.00
Villa Medici
The loves of of the between intrigues and enchantments
Meeting with Peter Boitani
In collaboration with the French Academy in Rome – Villa Medici
> Saturday 1 December 2018, 11.30
Curia Iulia, entrance from Via dei Fori Imperiali
Love and adultery between gods and men
Meeting with Eva Cantarella and Maurizio betti
In collaboration with the Colosseum Archaeological Park
> Sunday 2 December 2018, 11.00 hours
Teatro argentina
A journey in the making: metamorphoses in contemporary arts
Meeting with Francis Bonami, Anthony Calbi and Steve DellaCasa
In collaboration with the Teatro di Roma, Teatro Nazionale
> Wednesday 5 December 2018, 21.00 pm
Elisha Theater
Between art and power. Ovid and Emperor Augustus: guilty or innocent?
Within the cycle "La Storia a Processo" by Elisa Greco
> Tuesday 08 January 2019, 18.00
Palazzo Altemps
The "arts" of the Metamorphoses: from Pygmalion to Hitchcock, da Arachne to Marina Abramovich
Meeting with Claudia Cieri Via, Andrea Cortellessa and Victor Stoichita
In collaboration with the National Roman Museum
> Thursday 10 January 2019, 18.00 hours
Academy of Romania
Far from Rome: Ovid and the words of exile
Meeting with Maria Grazia Ciani, Andrea Cortellessa and Victor Stoichita
All meetings are free admission subject to availability.
For the appointment of the cycle "La Storia a Processo" tickets and info on www.teatroeliseo.com. Special reductions for ticket holders of the exhibition “Ovidio. Love, myths and other stories”
More stories: Ovidio with le Scuderie of the Quirinal
> Saturday 27 October 2018, 11.30
Park Archaeological of the Colosseum
Guided visit to the places of power of the Roman Forum
> Wednesday 7 November 2018, 18.00 pm
Didactic Room
The poet of the myth. Ovid and his time
Presentation of the book by Francesca Ghedini.
With Francesca Ghedini, Andrea Cucchiarelli and Daniele Manacorda
> Saturday 17 November 2018, 11.30
Park Archaeological of the Colosseum
Guided visit to the places of power of the Roman Forum
> Friday 14 December and Friday 21 December 2018, 18.00
Exhibition halls on the second floor
Aloud. The verses of Ovid recited in the halls.
Sebastiano Lo Monaco reading the verses of Ovid.
> Friday 28 December 2018 and Friday 04 January 2019, 18.00 and 19.30
Exhibition halls on the second floor
Vox Imagine: lunge for exhibition spaces in the verses of Ovid. The myth of Echo and Narcissus
The nudity of the verses of Book III of the Metamorphoses on display in a tribute to the poetry of Ovid
Edited by and with Marco Ride them and Lorenzo Gioielli
> Friday 11 January 2019, 18.00 hours
Didactic Room
From the labyrinth to the starry sky: the mythical journey of the girl Ariadne in search of the lost good.
Conversation with Alessandra Fine
For more information: www.scuderiequirinale.it
