15 PADOVA

ORAZIO MARINALI

Orazio Marinali, Head of Holofernes, marble, cm 32x44x37,5

The beautiful head of the Assyrian general Holofernes, killed by Judith, was attributed to the sculptor Filippo Parodi. The dramatic vis , similar to the results attained by the “tenebrosi” from Veneto, the plasticity of volumes, the technical virtuosity, are all elements related to the sculpture production in Veneto in the second half of the 17 th century and to Le Court in particular. What indicates Orazio Marinali as the probable author is rather the rougher and more spontaneous impact of the work. We still don't know who commissioned the sculpture, even if its grim subject and the dramatic force of the figure make it apt for meditation on sin – Holofernes is the personification of Vice defeated by Virtue, embodied by Judith – and on death.

MAX BOLDRIN

Max Boldrin was born in Padua in 1974. He took his diploma from the liceo artistico and then attended the professional school of photography. He participated in several solo and group exhibitions.
maxboldrin@libero.it

My sweet Holofernes, two photographs on a poster (double face) in white wood similar to the one used in election campaigns, cm. 110x70x100, 2003

CERCHIA DI ALESSANDRO VAROTARI

Circle of Alessandro Varotari, known as il Padovanino, Salomé,
canvas, cm 102x74

This painting by Alessandro Varotari is considered a copy from the Salomé by Tiziano al Prado, whose model was identified with the painter's daughter, Lavinia. Though the copy tries to be formally faithful to the original painting, it shows however some differences in the definition of ornaments, in the position of the head on the tray and in the rendering of the garment. As in many other copies of Titianesque inspiration, Padovanino turns his attention to the production by Vecellio of the first half of the 16 th century and shows an obsequious respect to form.

CHIARA FABBRI COLABICH

Chiara Fabbri Colabich was born in Padua in 1977. She took her diploma from the Academy of Fine Arts in Venice in 2001. She participated in several group exhibitions and recently in a multimedia workshop between Marseilles and Algiers, part of the 11 th Biennial of Young Artists of Europe and the Mediterranean.
chiarafc@hotmail.com

Who is Salomé dancing for, 7 veils and 70 letters in sandwich, 2003

SALA DELL' 800 - MUSEO BOTTACCIN

The 19 Century Room in the Museo Bottacin

The Museo Bottacin houses a collection of paintings and sculptures dating back to the 19 th century, the majority of them coming from Villa Bottacin in Trieste. The religious-moral subject is interpreted in the Angelo custode (The guardian angel) by Antonio Zona and in the two paintings by Fortunato Bello. The life of common people, a typical subject of genre painting, is represented in La supplente della mamma (Mum's substitute) by Domenico Induno and in Fanciulla coricata con farfalla (Lying girl with butterfly) by Antonio Rotta. Bottacin also collected some works of conservative taste, such as La Toilette by Natale Schiavoni and some views of Venice inspired by Canaletto's works painted by Luigi Querena. Hayez's historical-romantic tradition is represented in the big painting Francesco Ferrucci sulle mura di Volterra (Francesco Ferrucci on the ramparts of Volterra) by Cesare dell'Acqua. As for sculpture, Bottacin was deeply influenced by the bourgeois taste of the 19 th century, clearly visible in the terracotta bust of the Doge Paolo Renier by Antonio Canova, in the Flora by Vincenzo Vela, in the Leggitrice (The Reader) and the Disegnatrice (The Drawer) by Pietro Magni. The City of Padua expressed his gratitude to Nicolò Bottacin commissioning a bust to Angelo Cameroni.

CLAUDIA FABRIS

Claudia Fabris, thirty years old. Her artistic research ranges from theatre to photography to dress-designing in a sort of game of communicating vessels. Her fil rouge is the body: a body full of life, full of spirit, a body to be photographed naked and then dressed, a body to live a double life, a life doubled by theatre.
ratacla@libero.it

Let's pretend I was Cinderella and you…, original creations of velvet and silk, worn by ten "Cinderellas" waiting for their prince in the Museum Rooms, 2003

PADOVA

	MUSEI CIVICI AGLI EREMITANI Piazza Eremitani, 8 tel. 049/8204551 MAX BOLDRIN CHIARA FABBRI COLABICH CLAUDIA FABRIS

critical text by Stefania Schiavon Holofernes, Salomé and the rooms of the Musei Civici inspired Max, Chiara and Claudia's artistic experience, becoming a significant step for their research. These artists were offered the opportunity to handle their usual language and expressive means to trace new paths, allowing their personal visions to be expressed.The result of this is that the spontaneously amusing and ridiculous side of contemporary human contradictions and uneasiness, often depicted in Max Boldrin's photos, gives way to the other side of the coin, the bitter and scathing look which remains after laughing at oneself and the others. That grimace suspended between laughter and its end is captured to tell, with Holofernes, the story of a yearning for power which is a defeat of man on man in all times and all places.Chiara Fabbri Colabich's work is characterised by an original research on communication. Salomé dancing the dance of the seven veils is, for the artist, like a linguistic plot where the imagined movement of the body becomes writing. Dance, being sign and word itself, beats the time of the sequence where love feelings develop, feelings of desire and destruction leading to reach one's aim at any cost.Since every woman deserves to live a fairy tale moment in her ordinary life, Claudia Fabris makes ten dresses for ten Cinderellas. Seamless coloured cloth to plunge into colour, sensations to wear and to play with, dresses that offer the women who wear them the opportunity to express themselves in a creative way, dresses that roll and unroll, that change their shape, as if they lived to enhance the peculiarity and beauty of the bodies they wrap.