Ugo Nespolo

Life and works

Nespolo graduated at the Accademia Albertina di Belle Arti of Turin with Enrico Paulucci and obtained a degree in Modern Literature at the University of Turin, with a thesis on Semiology.

His career as an artist started in the 1960s and his work was influenced by Pop Art, which was becoming popular in Italy in those years, conceptual art, Arte Povera and Fluxus. he met and appreciated these movements during his frequent trips to the United States. After the first trip in 1967, he regularly visited the States, where he spent long periods especially during the 1980s. Since then, irony and transgression are part of his art and characterise Nespolo's work in the years to come. Since 2010 he has been member of the Honour Committee of Immagine & Poesia, an artistic literary movement founded in Turin, with the patronage of Aeronwy Thomas (Dylan Thomas's daughter). In 2016 he signed the pptArt Manifesto .

Cinema

In mid 1960s Nespolo started to work for artistic and experimental cinema. His first movie is Grazie, mamma Kodak in 1966. His friends and artists, such as Lucio Fontana, Enrico Baj, Michelangelo Pistoletto and others, appeared in his films. The film A.G. (1968) documents the visit in Turin of Allen Ginsberg. In 2001 he directed Film/a/TO, interpreted by Edoardo Sanguineti. Nespolo's films have been exhibited in institutions like the Beaubourg in Paris, the Philadelphia Museum of Modern Art, Warsaw's Filmoteka Polska and Ferrara's Galleria Civica d'Arte Moderna. The activity in this field has been particularly intense during the 1970s and the 2000s (decade). He has done about twenty films over forty years.

Applied arts

In the 1980s, Nespolo made ceramics and blown glass objects, created over fifty posters for exhibitions and other events, did advertising campaigns - the ones for Campari and Azzurra are the most famous - and realised title sequences for shows on the Italian television RAI. In 2002, Nespolo was appointed artistic coordinator for the Metropolitana di Torino, with the aim of realising the first "underground museum of modern art". Several underground stations are decorated with his glass etchings and images.

Theatre

In 1986 Nespolo had the possibility of designing the stage sets for Ferruccio Busoni’s opera Turandot at Connecticut Grand Opera, Stamford, the first of several theatre works he made in the following years, such as the sets and costumes for Paisiello's Don Chisciotte at the Teatro dell'Opera di Roma in 1990 and for Donizetti's L'elisir d'amore, a production for the Rome Opera, the Paris Opera and the Lausanne Opera, Liège and Metz in 1995. In 2007, he designed stage and costumes for Puccini's Madama Butterfly at the Festival Puccini 2007 in Torre del Lago.

Palio and traditions

Nespolo was appreciated also for his work with Palios. In 1998, he was committed the Palio for the Giostra della Quintana, Ascoli Piceno. In 2000, he was awarded for his work for Palio di Asti and in 1991 and 2009 for the Palio of the Giostra della Quintana in Foligno. He was chosen to design the Palio (Drappellone or banner) at the Palio dell'Assunta in August 2007.

Selected exhibitions

Nespolo's works covering his whole production have been presented or hosted in major national and international exhibitions, .

A selected list of exhibitions and venues is the following:

Filmography

Nespolo's filmography includes: