Fondazione Memmo

Menu
Close
  • The Foundation

  • Exhibitions

    • Current
    • Past
  • Projects

    • Social Networks Special Project
    • Characteristica Universalis
    • Call Gasworks
    • Workshops
    • Talks & conferences
    • Curricular stages
  • Catalogues

  • Press

  • Contacts

IT – EN

The Foundation

In 1990 Roberto Memmo, who had always been interested in the forms and expressions of art, established a private foundation, the Fondazione Memmo, of which he became the President, together with 3 vice-presidents: Daniela Memmo d’Amelio, Patrizia Memmo Ruspoli and Claudio Strinati, who at that time was the General Director of the Italian Ministry for Cultural and Artistic Heritage.

Due to his passion for beauty and his understanding of the importance of making its values more widespread, he wished to share the creativity of the great masters with a wider public through the contemplation of works that are fundamental for the history of art. At that period very few museums in Italy had a dynamic and active approach, but the time was ripe for creating new private and public spaces for art in several Italian cities, with many of which the foundation would collaborate over the years.

The President of the Fondazione Memmo organized a series of exhibitions of a high cultural level, in the ample exhibition spaces on the first floor of Palazzo Ruspoli in Rome, some of which were promoted in collaboration with some of the most important museums in the world, such as the Getty Museum in Los Angeles, the British Museum, the Egyptian Museum of Cairo, as well as with the cooperation of influential curators such as Morris Bierbrier, Christopher White, Catherine Whistler, Sir Denis Mahon and Felipe Garin Llombart.

The first of these exhibitions, Espressionismo-Da Van Gogh a Klee, was realized in 1990 together with the Thyssen-Bornemisza Foundation of Lugano. This was followed in 1991 by Il segno del Genio: cento disegni dall’Ashmolean Museum di Oxford, featuring an impressive range of drawings by Italian and European old masters such as Raphael, Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci and Dürer, as well as sketches by Canova from the Hermitage. In the same year the Fondazione Memmo organized the first solo exhibition in Italy devoted to Lucien Freud, which revealed the President’s foresight regarding the growing importance of this painter.

In 1994 Nefertari – Luce d’Egitto gave the public the possibility to admire the tomb of the Egyptian queen Nefertiti thanks to the new techniques of virtual reality. The next exhibitions were: Alessandro Magno: storia e mito (1995); Fayum – Misteriosi volti dall’Egitto (1996); Cleopatra (2000) and in 2001Velazquez – Il suo terzo viaggio in Italia (realized thanks to the generous and exceptional loan of several paintings from the Prado Museum of Madrid). These shows were followed by Cristina di Svezia. Le Collezioni Reali (2003); I Tesori degli Atzechi (2004); and three exhibitions in 2008 alone: Picasso e la sua epoca, Paul Klee and Jean-Michel Basquiat.

The numbers of people who came to see these exhibitions was absolutely exceptional. For example there were 500,000 visitors to the exhibition Nefertari — Luce d’Egitto, which made it the Italian exhibition with the greatest public turnout in 1994 and the seventh most popular in that year worldwide. Over a period of less than twenty years there more than three million people have come to see the exhibitions organized by the Fondazione Memmo.

At the beginning of the 2000s, Roberto Memmo decided to open a venue of the Fondazione also in Lecce. Worthy of mention is the large exhibition of clothes conceived by the stylist Roberto Capucci, set up in the castle of Charles V. We also remember the restoration of the Roman Theater, which reopened its doors to the visitors.

In 2012 the direction board presented a new exhibition programme, entirely dedicated to the contemporary art scene.

The aim is to contribute to the development of a local cultural texture in a global perspective, connecting international realities and promoting the interaction between the artists and the city of Rome.

Through the organization and production of exhibitions, performances, residencies, talks, conferences, workshops and arts publications, the Fondazione Memmo desires to promote the present time in order to contribute to the development of our future.

The new program started in 2012 with the residency and the exhibition of the American artist Sara VanDerBeek, followed in 2013 by the exhibition CHRON II dedicated to Sterling Ruby and in 2014 by AutoBody Collision, a solo show of Shannon Ebner.
In 2015 a new group show titled Conversation Piece, curated by Marcello Smarrelli, has been presented to the public; yearly editions have followed, involving artists who are at the moment living in Rome and attending foreign academies that play an active role in the city.
In 2016 Fondazione hosted Monday, a solo show by the french artist Camille Henrot; in 2017 the italian artist Giuseppe Gabellone has been invited for a solo exhibition curated by Fancesco Stocchi who has also curated in 2018 Kerstin Brätsch_Ruine and KAYA_KOVO, in 2019 Latifa Echakhch Romance and in 2021 Oscar Murillo spirits and gestures.

1990-2010

  • 2009
    2009
    Gli anni di Grace Kelly Principessa di Monaco
  • 2009
    2009
    Presentism – Time and Space in the long now
  • 2009
    2009
    Antichi telai
  • 2008
    2008
    Jean Michel Basquiat _ Fantasmi da scacciare
  • 2007
    2007
    Da Cranach a Monet _ Capolavori della collezione Pérez Simòn
  • 2006
    2006
    Paul Klee _ La collezione Berggruen
  • 2005
    2005
    Principato di Monaco _ Idea per un museo
  • 2005
    2005
    Fasto Principesco _ La corte di Dresda
  • 2004
    2004
    Picasso e la sua epoca
  • 2004
    2004
    I tesori degli Aztechi
  • 2003
    2003
    Cristina di Svezia _ Le collezioni Reali
  • 2002
    2002
    I Borgia _ L’arte del potere
  • 2002
    2002
    Il trionfo del colore _ collezione Thyssen Bornemisza
  • 2001
    2001
    Velazquez _ Il suo terzo viaggio in Italia
  • 2000
    2000
    Cleopatra _ Regina d’Egitto
  • 2000
    2000
    Yemen _ Nel paese della regina di Saba
  • 1999
    1999
    Bagliori del Medioevo
  • 1998
    1998
    Alla scoperta del barocco italiano _ collezione Sir Denis Mahon
  • 1997
    1997
    FAYUM _ Misteriosi volti dall’Egitto
  • 1997
    1997
    La via Appia _ Sulle ruine della magnificenza antica
  • 1996
    1996
    L’Altare di Pergamo: il Fregio di Telefo
  • 1995
    1995
    Alessandro Magno – Storia e Mito
  • 1994
    1994
    Nefertari regina d’Egitto
  • 1993
    1993
    LA COLLEZIONE BONCOMPAGNI LUDOVISI, Algardi, Bernini e la fortuna dell’Antico
  • 1993
    1993
    I Postmacchiaioli
  • 1993
    1993
    Mino Maccari
  • 1993
    1993
    Dipinti del 900 italiano _ La collezione Assitalia
  • 1992
    1992
    Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio – Come nascono i capolavori
  • 1991
    1991
    Canova all’Ermitage e la collezione Farsetti
  • 1991
    1991
    Lucien Freud
  • 1991
    1991
    IL SEGNO DEL GENIO. LEONARDO, MICHELANGELO, RAFFAELLO….CENTO CAPOLAVORI DA OXFORD
  • 1990
    1990
    Espressionismo

via Fontanella Borghese 56b
00186 – Roma

T +39 06 68136598
info@fondazionememmo.it

via Fontanella Borghese 56b
00186 – Roma

T +39 06 68136598
info@fondazionememmo.it

Newsletter  Subscribe
Credits
Walter Santomauro (Art Direction & Design)
Simone Ballesio (Web Development)

Rucellai srl, via dei Condotti 91
00187 Roma, P.I./C.F. 03953741000

©2023 Fondazione Memmo. All rights reserved

Questo sito utilizza cookie per migliorare l'esperienza online.

Per maggiori informazioni, consulta la nostra Privacy Policy. | Close