EXHIBITIONS

Museums and archaeological sites in Rome, including the Vatican Museums, are open only to visitors with the covid 'Green Pass' or its equivalent. Most venues require advance booking and the wearing of masks is obligatory. Weekend visits to the more popular sites such as the Colosseum and the Pantheon must be booked at least one day ahead. For visiting details check websites in advance.

Sebastião Salgado at MAXXI. Yanomami shaman talking to the spirits before climbing Mount Pico da Neblina. Amazonas State, Brazil, 2014.

INFERNO

15 OCT-9 JAN

Following the success of the Raphael 500 exhibition, the Scuderie del Quirinale returns with a new show marking another important milestone: the 700th anniversary of the death of Dante Alighieri. The exhibition based on the first book of The Divine Comedy will comprise more than 200 artworks on loan from 80 museums, public collections and private collections from Italy, the Vatican and across Europe. Inferno will document hell-related iconography from the Middle Ages to the present day, in what is hailed as the first major art exhibition dedicated to this theme. Curated by Jean Clair, the show will take visitors on a terrifying visual journey into the depths of hell, as imagined by artists through the centuries, accompanied by the words of Dante. These visions range from the tormented and nightmarish to the romanticised, from Mediaeval to Baroque, up to psychoanalytic interpretations from the 20th century. The exhibition also presents scenes of “hell on earth” and delves into the concept of salvation, as offered by Dante in the last canto of the Inferno Canticle: “…And so we went out to see the stars again.” During the show’s first weeks, visitors will be able to gaze into the Abyss of Hell by Botticelli, on loan from the Vatican, together with a scale plaster cast model of Rodin’s Gates of Hell from the Musée Rodin in Paris. There will be other masterpieces too, by artists including Beato Angelico, Botticelli, Bosch, Bruegel, Cézanne, Delacroix, Goya, Kiefer, Manet, Richter and Rodin. Scuderie del Quirinale, Via XXIV Maggio 16, www.scuderiequirinale.it.

Inferno at Scuderie del Quirinale. Pieter Huys Inferno, 1570. © Museo Nacional del Prado.

TOKUHIRO KAWAI AND JEFFREY CHONG WANG

16 OCT-NOV

Dorothy Circus, a prominent gallery specialising in international pop-surrealist art, presents a double exhibition by two artists: Beijing-raised and Canada-based Jeffrey Chong Wang and Japan’s Tokuhiro Kawai. The gallery says that Kawai draws from classical Renaissance themes to elaborate surreal fairytales while Chong Wang gains inspiration from Romanticism to create cinematographic reflections. Dorothy Circus Gallery, Via dei Pettinari 76, www. dorothycircusgallery.it.

The celebrated photojournalist Sebastião Salgado provides a black and white photographic journey through the Brazilian Amazon, after he spent six years capturing images of the forest, the rivers, the mountains and the people who live there. MAXXI, Italy’s national museum of 21st-century arts, presents Salgado’s 200 photographs against a soundscape of sounds - recorded in the forests and created by Jean-Michel Jarre - feauring the rustling of trees, birdsong, the shrieks of animals, and the roar of waterfalls. The exhibition highlights the fragility of this ecosystem, showing that in the protected areas where the indigenous communities live the forest has suffered almost no damage. MAXXI, Via Guido Reni 4A, www.maxxi.art.

RIA LUSSI: WHO IS AFRAID OF PINK?

30 SEPT-13 NOV

Maja Arte Contemporanea presents a show by the Rome-based Milan artist Ria Lussi, the final stage of the gallery’s two-year cycle of exhibitions dedicated to female artists. With her collection of ironic and playful self-portraits, Lussi challenges the current gender disparity through permutations of her “Rose” series painted on round-shaped canvases. Maja Arte Contemporanea, Via di Monserrato 30, www. majartecontemporanea.com.

ERWIN WURM

25 SEPT-14 NOV

Rome’s Via Veneto has been filled with large-scale artworks by the Austrian artist Erwin Wurm in an open-air exhibition that opens on 25 September. The elegant street, synonymous with Rome’s ‘dolce vita’ era of in the 1960s, is currently home to 14 installations thanks to the Via Veneto Contemporanea project, curated by Catherine Löwe. Wurm’s semi-abstract sculptures, which present mundane objects in a new surprising light, are dotted along Via Veneto and in front of the Aurelian walls. Framed by the ancient arch of the Porta Pinciana is Big Mutter, a large hot water bottle with legs, while other pieces include Fat House and sculptures of suitcases with legs. The exhibition, which runs until 14 November, is Wurm’s first urban installation in Rome.

DAMIEN HIRST AT GALLERIA BORGHESE

8 JUNE-7 NOV

Galleria Borghese – home to masterpieces by Bernini, Canova and Caravaggio – presents the works of contemporary British artist Damien Hirst in a new exhibition titled Archaeology Now. The show includes more than 80 works from Hirst’s Treasures from the Wreck of the Unbelievable series, featuring monumental and smallscale sculptures made from bronze, rock crystal, coral and Carrara marble. Also on display in the Rome exhibition, curated by Anna Coliva and Mario Codognato, are Hirst’s Colour Space paintings, exhibited in Italy for the first time. Held with the support of luxury fashion house Prada, the exhibition will see Hirst’s colossal sculpture, Hydra and Kali, displayed outdoors in the Secret Garden of the Uccelliera. Galleria Borghese says the installation stems from Hirst’s Treasures from the Wreck of the Unbelievable, exhibited for the first time in 2017 in Venice at Palazzo Grassi and Punta della Dogana. Retracing his colourful career, the Rome retrospective highlights the multimedia approach of the British artist who is known for his provocative art charged with social commentary. Reservations obligatory, via Galleria Borghese website. Piazzale Scipione Borghese 5, tel. 068413979, www.galleriaborghese. beniculturali.it.

Ria Lussi at Maja Arte Cotemporanea. La rosa giocosa.

ALL ABOUT BANKSY: EXHIBITION 2

5 MAY-9 JAN

Chiostro del Bramante presents ALL about BANKSY, a new exhibition dedicated to the anonymous British street artist whose powerful, satirical and thought-provoking murals are celebrated around the world. The show, which follows an earlier Banksy exhibition, features about 250 artworks from private collections. Chiostro del Bramante, Via Arco della Pace 5, tel. 0668809035, www. chiostrodelbramante.it.

Fat House by Erwin Wurm on Via Veneto.