It will be open until 16 April for the exhibition ‘Goliardo Padova. La forma del tormento”, curated by Giulia Castagnetti and Giulia Ferrari, with which the CSAC once again reflects on the figure of an artist whose collection, preserved in the archive itself, counts almost four hundred works including canvases and drawings, posters and engravings donated by his heirs.
With this exhibition, the CSAC opens a series of exhibitions in the Sala delle Colonne, characterised by common elements despite the diversity of themes, topics, authors and genres to which each is dedicated. All exhibitions generated by archival surveys conducted by staff working in the Centre combine the functions of archival preservation and management with those of heritage enhancement and knowledge dissemination. Mostre originali, per i temi selezionati, oppure per il taglio critico dato, o per i materiali inediti scelti, e mostre characterised by low environmental and financial impact designThe layout design, graphics and actual realisation are also entirely conducted by the in-house technical staff, with particular attention to the reuse of materials, furniture, supports and structures.
Thus, an idea of cultural production that values design and implementation skills, continuity between intellectual elaboration and operational and managerial implementation, characteristics that have always been the heritage of the CSAC and the University.
As far back as 1985, Arturo Carlo Quintavalle published an article entitled Goliardo Padova and European Expressionism, outlining what is now intended to be the key that has guided the selection of a nucleus of works within the artist’s variegated corpus preserved at the CSAC.
Goliardo Padova (Casalmaggiore, CR, 1909 – Parma 1979), after an education at the Art Institute in Parma and the Brera Academy of Fine Arts, became involved in the most up-to-date Milanese cultural circles and became assistant professor to Guido Marussing at the Scuola Superiore per gli Artefici.
He experimented with and mastered a variety of artistic languages, including decorative and architectural composition and advertising graphics. His field of choice, however, is easel painting, in which the depiction of his homeland finds greater space.
After an initial experience in close contact with the Novecento Group and the Milanese Chiaristi, he arrived at a highly personal interpretation of reality.
Goliardo Padova’s canvases have often been approached by critics, due to an affinity of subjects treated, to the group of so-called ‘last naturalists’ from the Po Valley, as defined by Francesco Arcangeli in the pages of Paragone in 1954.
Although there is no lack of references in Padua’s works to such close artists as Mattia Moreni, Ennio Morlotti and others, with La forma del tormento we wish to emphasise the great fascination that expressionist art has played in his career
Expressionism, in fact, read and learnt in its various facets, is for him a suitable means of giving voice to his own, burning inner conflict.
A first selection of works testifies to the early attention Padua paid to these languages as early as the 1930s and 1940s: the choice, first and foremost, of techniques such as woodcuts, the hard, decisive strokes in the figures that animate his prints, bring to mind the direct taste for a form of primitivism so beloved of the German masters.
In 1943 came the great rupture that indelibly marked Padua, as an artist but above all as a man: he was deported to Germany to a concentration camp from which he managed to escape four years later.
A painful silence followed, lasting almost a decade, but it was in the subsequent return to painting, mainly through the use of expressionist language, that Padua was able to give voice to his torment.
The exhibition presents, through five sections, the fascination and admiration that Padua had for the great masters throughout his careerfrom Munch and Heckel to Kirchner via the Post-Impressionists and on to the European and American Informal, resulting in an innovative and entirely personal reworking of contemporary language.
Goliardo Padova. La forma del tormento
edited by Giulia Castagnetti and Giulia Ferrari
CSAC, Università di Parma
Abbey of Valserena
Strada Viazza di Paradigna, 1, 43123 Parma PR
Exhibition opening: 4 March 2023 – 16 April 2023
Museum opening hours:
Friday 9 am – 3 pm | Saturday and Sunday 10 am – 7 pm
Tuesday to Thursday guided tours by appointment.
Educational workshop: The Shape of Colour: An Educational Experience of the Works of Goliardo Padova,
For families: Saturday 1 and Sunday 2 April, 3 p.m. and 4 p.m., reservation required
For schools: 27-31 March, by appointment
Info and reservations:
tel. 0521 903649
e-mail csac@unipr.it, servizimuseali@csacparma.it
website: https://www.csacparma.it/goliardo-padova-la-forma-del-tormento/
