10 exhibitions for 2018

What role has graphics played in politics over the last 10 years? The London Design Museum examines actions and reactions translated into highly powerful images. Moments that have shaped the world beginning from 2008, the year of the global economic crisis. They clearly demonstrate how graphic design has played an influential role. From Brexit to the Arab Spring, it is astounding to see how certain figures have already become part of our collective consciousness.

Among the 4 excellent projects produced by Pirelli HangarBicocca for 2018, the one-person show dedicated to Leonor Antunes is not to be missed. Artisan techniques and traditional materials (rope, wood, brass, leather, rubber and cork), for powerful works with an evident link to architecture. In particular, for the new works present and for the site-specific installation, the Portuguese artist makes reference to Franca Helg, Bruno Munari, Franco Albini and Milanese Modernism traditions.

MoMA is dedicating an important retrospective to the Congolese sculptor Bodys Isek Kingelez (1948 - 2015), who used unusual materials such as paper or commercial packaging to create that which he described as “extreme maquettes”. For the first time ever, visitors will be able to see the first works, which concentrated on sculptures of individual architectural works, as well as the more recent pieces which represent sprawling metropoles on a large scale, and the final futurist and visionary urban landscapes. The exhibition design will be produced in collaboration with the artist Carsten Höller

Obsession: 50 nudes by Gustave Klimt (1862 - 1918), Egon Schiele (1890 - 1918), and Pablo Picasso (1881 - 1973). The masterpieces, all part of the Scofield Thayer Collection (belonging to the Met) are being shown together for the first time. They express the atmosphere of a very particular era, and the passions of Thayer (1889 - 1982). A patient of Sigmund Freud in Vienna, in the space of only two years he had collected over 600 works by artists who were still unknown at the time in his country of Austria.

Contemporary culture examined through clubs and discotheques, free and stimulating spaces where graphics, interior architecture, design, fashion, art and much more is experimented. From the 1960s to today, with an excellent selection of period documentation (films, photographs, installations, posters), this exhibition brings together the Italian discotheques made by the Radicals, the legendary Studio 54 in New York, the studies by OMA for the Ministry of Sound in London, and the design for the New York Palladium by Arata Isozaki.

The first important one-person show dedicated to Danh Vo in the United States. The Danish artist who was born in Vietnam has always focused on themes such as colonialism, capitalism, memory, religion and a sense of belonging. Mixing his personal history with universal events with a sensitivity and a strength which has made him, in his forties, one of the most interesting artists of the moment. The exhibition shows works from the last 15 years, and a large number of works produced specially for the occasion.

Around one hundred works examine the power and intensity of human existence portrayed on canvas. Bodies which are abandoned, suffering, bored or simply immersed in daily activities Surrounding the predominant figures of Lucian Freud (1922 - 2011) and Francis Bacon (1909 - 1992), a selection of some of the most famous British artists from the last century. A wide-ranging reflection on the famous words spoken by Freud: “I want the paint to work as flesh does”.

A new retrospective dedicated to Frida Kahlo (1907 - 1954) which not only brings together works from the Dolores Olmedo Museum in the City of Mexico, and from the Jacques and Natasha Gelman Collection, (the two most important collections dedicated to the Mexican artist), but also benefits from the collaboration of the Casa Azul archive and many other institutions. The curator Diego Sileo speaks of a brand-new approach which will allow the exhibition to go “beyond the legend”. At the same time, the Mudec is preparing a series of very interesting conferences and events which examine the artist in further detail, and the Mexican Cultural Festival will be directly involved.

150 works from all around the world, including paintings, photographs, collages, assemblages, experimental films, objects and works on paper in an attempt to define the figure of Man Ray, (1890 - 1976), an enigmatic artist who made his mark at the time and who continues to influence the modern world. This exhibition seeks to examine “the universal Man Ray”, too often reduced to a few famous and stereotypical elements, which do not take into consideration the manifold and complex production of the artist.

In the run-up to the 50th anniversary of the moon landing made by Apollo 11 in 1969, an important exhibition examines the various human ambitions dedicated to Earth’s satellite, considered an object of desire, an artistic symbol, and the object of scientific research. Through literature, film, architecture, design and art, as well as natural history and historical artefacts, the Louisiana presents the moon in all its aspects, which range from David Bowie to Disney cartoons.