Cortesi Gallery is pleased to announce the opening of the exhibition “Pietro Consagra. Colloquio diabolico,” curated by Alberto Salvadori in collaboration with the Pietro Consagra Archive. The exhibition will be held from April 1 to June 27, 2025, at the gallery’s Milan location, Via Morigi 8.
The solo show is part of the gallery’s program dedicated to Italian artists who have shaped the evolution of the 20th-century art system. The decision to present Consagra’s work stems from the desire to delve deeper into his contribution to the redefinition of modern sculpture, with particular attention to his “psychological” abstractionism and the frontal nature of his art. In contrast to the sculptures, a selection of bitumen works, paintings on faesite, will also be on display, which convey, and in some cases allow the viewer to read, the dynamics of the creation of the “Colloqui” (made between 1952 and 1964), in their specific bidimensionality, essential for understanding Consagra’s works.
The exhibition opens with Colloquio diabolico, a historic piece in burned wood and bronze, first presented at the 1960 Venice Biennale, the year Consagra was awarded the International Sculpture Prize. After many decades, it is now being reintroduced to the Italian public in a new context. In the formative process of this piece, in addition to the fire, which becomes the most aggressive weapon, Consagra also used subtle bronze connections of great expressive strength to weave parts of the sculpture together, creating a frontal dialogue with the viewer. These connecting elements hold conceptual and creative value in the variety of thematic series and materials used by the sculptor, as seen in Colloquio in marmo bianco e bronzo and the Bitumi, the pictorial transpositions of drawings from which each sculpture originates, presented in the exhibition.
In the years following the Biennale, Consagra strengthened his ability to reinvent sculpture in a continuous, empathetic relationship with society. His reflection on symbolism and the search for environmental sculpture expressing moods expanded into new forms, sizes, and materials.
In 1962, his participation in one of the most important exhibitions ever held in Italy dedicated to sculpture in public spaces, Sculture nella città in Spoleto, was pivotal. For the occasion, critic Giovanni Carandente invited fifty-two of the most significant 20th-century sculptors—such as Alexander Calder, Lynn Chadwick, Henry Moore, David Smith, and Arnaldo Pomodoro, just to name a few—to exhibit in the Umbrian town during the Festival dei Due Mondi, an international cultural event still part of Spoleto’s summer program. Consagra described that experience as “the greatest enjoyment I’ve ever had with so many sculptors in the everyday traffic… we all gave our best. The world’s sculptors will always thank Giovanni Carandente, and Spoleto will remain unique.”
The works presented in Umbria had an urban quality made possible by the sponsorship of Italsider, one of Italy’s most important steel industries at the time. It provided knowledge and resources for the artists to work in their workshops. This was skillfully documented through a series of images by Ugo Mulas and a documentary from the Ansaldo Foundation’s film archive, from which an excerpt is shown in the exhibition. For the occasion, Consagra presented, among others, a work dedicated to a very special theme: Racconto del demonio, also known as Colloquio spoletino, composed of five suspended iron sculptures on a cross-shaped iron structure, reinforcing the underground expressiveness of the theme, which references the medieval culture of the town. The airy sculptural installation was placed along a pedestrian path, facing the passersby, foreshadowing the lightness of the later season of colorful Ferris trasparenti.
Consagra created the bronze versions of these sculptures, which are presented here for the first time, all aligned in sequence, just as they were in Spoleto.
The diabolical subject is of great interest and highlights Consagra’s attention to a territory rich in legends related to the figure of the devil. Spoleto itself features the presence of a demon in a bas-relief on the facade of the Basilica of San Pietro. The scene depicts the death of the righteous and the weighing of souls. The saint is shown twice: in the first, holding the key as he frees the righteous from chains while Saint Michael the Archangel weighs the soul on balance, at which point a demon attempts to tip the scale in its favour, only to be punished by the saint with a blow from the key. This is just one of many stories from a land where a bridge, a cave, and mountains recount the devil’s presence as part of the history and culture.
The exhibition Pietro Consagra. Colloquio diabolico offers an extraordinary opportunity to admire the artist’s incredible ability to combine monumental dimensions with symbolism, offering a new vision of 20th-century sculpture. The exhibition, marking the return of iconic works such as Colloquio diabolico, is a tribute to the innovation and artistic research of the great Sicilian sculptor.
