Pierpaolo Barzan

Pierpaolo Barzan

October 2009 Field Guide

Anthony McCall

Subodh Gupta

Slash: Paper Under the Knife

Artnear

Urs Fischer

Intersections: Grand Concourse

Andy Warhol: Mr. America

Robert Rauschenberg Jasper Johns Barry Mcgee Sterling Ruby Terence Koh Ryan McGinley Jules de Balincourt Nate Lowman

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Last month, the Italian art collector Pierpaolo Barzan opened Depart, a new contemporary-art foundation outside Rome. For the inaugural show, "New York Minute: 60 Artists on the New York Scene," held at MACRo Future (Museo d’Arte Contemporanea di Roma’s second venue), Barzan brought in the director of Deitch Projects, Kathy Grayson, the doyenne of New York’s young art scene. Though polemicists have criticized the show as a vanity project that associates Barzan with a particular group of well-marketed, glamorous artists and their Basquiat-esque lifestyle, Grayson argues that the collaboration captures what she names as three historically important art trends in this young scene: "Street Punk" (i.e., the work of the late Dash Snow, Kembra Pfahler, Terence Koh), "Wild Figuration" (Jules de Balincourt, Takeshi Murata), and the "New Abstraction" (Dan Colen, Sterling Ruby). Marina Cashdan spoke to Barzan about the foundation, the controversial exhibition, and the future of contemporary art in Rome.

What is your relationship to New York and this particular New York art scene? Why make this your first show?

I have always had a real passion for New York, and [in] my collection, [there are] a lot of younger American artists who are coming from New York.

Most of the artists in the show are based in New York (with a few exceptions, such as the San Francisco-based Barry McGee). Many — including Agathe Snow, Dan Colen, Ryan McGinley, and Nate Lowman — make up a very specific, and often scrutinized, group of artists. Is the show focusing overall on the next generation of artists in New York or this group specifically?

Yes, the exhibition is not really a survey about New York art [but about] a specific group of artists that share a strong bond — friends that work together.

How are the works presented?

It’s not a usual exhibition. It’s more of a happening, opened by a concert by A.R.E. Weapons and with DJ sets, performances, and screenings throughout the duration of the show. We want to showcase a lifestyle, not only artworks.

How do you hope this will affect the contemporary-art scene in Rome?

I think it will be a very effective way of bringing a younger audience to a museum show, and this is part of the foundation’s mission — trying to help contemporary art by broadening the audience. Contemporary Rome and in Italy in general is very traditional, and I think this has the possibility of being a big breakthrough exhibition.

With this in mind, are you hoping that the "New York Minute" show will then be an inspiration for young Italian artists?

I think that it will be very special for the Italians. By bringing a well-established system of artists to Rome, we would first of all like to re-create the bond that has always existed between New York and Rome. If you think about the ’50s and the ’60s, you have artists like Jasper Johns and Robert Rauschenberg who ultimately stayed in Rome — creating movements with what Rome had to offer in terms of history and old monuments. It really changed the perspective of art. So, with this show we want to re-create this bond that has been lost; this is an endeavor to try and bring back a dialogue between these two cities.

You bring up Rauschenberg and Johns, who, with their introduction of theater, technology, and performance art, opened up a new dimension in the modern artworld in the States. Is that the idea of Depart, but for Rome?

Yes, in a way. To me, contemporary art is something broader than just visual art — it involves performances, video works, design. I mean, it’s the contemporary in general that Depart wants to foster rather than only visual art. What I see is that, unfortunately in Italy, contemporary artists perceive it as something that does not belong to them.

Are the institutions creating this feeling?

There is not a clear vision from the Italian government in general to invest in contemporary art and architecture. For example, you see all the polemics [surrounding] the Richard Meier [Ara Pacis] building in Rome. That is a reflection of how modern architecture is perceived in Italy, which is very bad because I think that tourists in Rome come to see the Coliseum like people go to Egypt to see the Pyramids, and that’s it. We want people to come to Rome to see the past, because that’s the biggest thing to showcase, but also the present and why not the future? So that’s really the idea of Depart. It’s helping to depart, to rejuvenate.