Claudio Parmiggiani

28 May-31 Aug 2025

Overview

The Estorick Collection presents the first ever institutional UK exhibition dedicated to pioneering contemporary Italian master Claudio Parmiggiani (b. Luzzara, 1943). Featuring selected works from the past 50 years, the exhibition highlights the artist’s distinctive exploration of themes of memory, absence and silence in his “search for an image, object or assemblage that transcends time and individual experience to evoke a universal, existential truth”.
 
After the Second World War, during a period of crisis for traditional figurative art, Parmiggiani developed a visual language that was both deeply personal and profoundly universal. His innovative approach positioned him as a pioneer of his time, redefining artistic expression through a unique and introspective lens.
 
At the heart of the exhibition are the Delocazioni (Italian for ‘displacements’) that employ smoke and soot to create ghostly impressions of negative space left by objects such as bottles, books, the human form and musical instruments. Originally conceived in the 1970s, this technique has become one of Parmiggiani’s most emblematic and recognisable methods, a recurrent and fundamental element of his oeuvre, and one of his most powerful ways of exploring absence.
 
The exhibition features both monumental and more intimate works from this iconic series. The panels on show depict bookcases where only traces of books remain, impressions of the burned remains of a library, windows and other recurring motifs in Parmiggiani’s work. Reminiscent of photograms but more fragile and evocative, these contemplative works function as poetic meditations on memory.
 
Also on view are works on paper and sculptural assemblages that the artist describes as “sculpted paintings”.
 
Organised in collaboration with the artist’s Archive and Tornabuoni Art, and supported by the Consul General of Italy in London as an event related to the celebrations of the Italian National Day, the exhibition will be accompanied by a fully illustrated catalogue.