Giovanni Gastel Exhibition at the MAXXI Museum

Piero Lissoni and Lissoni Associati curate the exhibition design for “Giovanni Gastel. The People I Like.” at the MAXXI Museum in Rome from September 15 to November 27 2020. The spatial layout of the exhibition design pays homage to the design of the Giovanni Gastel exhibition at the Palazzo della Ragione in Milan in 2016, and is presented as a tribute to Germano Celant, the art critic and curator of that respective who passed away recently.
The labyrinthine space is marked out by screens of varying sizes, to present the portraits of Gastel as if the individuals are looking out from windows onto an urban landscape. The collective dimension of the design speaks to the network of relationships and connections that the photographer cultivated throughout his career, while the introspective investigation of each subject reveals their specific individuality.
Typical of Gastel’s portraits, the colours of this small and imaginary town alternate between black and white, the same hues of the huge photograph of the artist that sits above the staircase and which greets visitors as they enter.