On the occasion of the 700th anniversary of Marco Polo’s death, the Fondazione Garuzzo presents at the China Academy of
Art in Hangzhou the exhibition Le Divisament dou Monde: Italian drawings on the Far East, curated by Angela Tecce. The exhibition is realised in collaboration with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation (MAECI) and the Italian Embassy in Beijing.
Through a refined selection of works on paper, the exhibition brings together more than forty Italian artists in a dialogue that investigates the visual, cultural and symbolic influence of the Far East on contemporary Italian art. These include Gianfranco Baruchello’s work entitled Circa 364 giorni dopo (1969-1971).
The title of the exhibition is taken from the first version that has come down to us of the Milione in the French-Venetian language, ‘Le Divisament dou Monde’, or the description of the world: just as Marco Polo wished to recount the wonders he had witnessed while travelling and living in such ‘other’ and distant places, so the exhibition intends to offer, through drawing, a cross-section of our imagination influenced by the millenary culture of the East and the many different relationships that have bound us to it for centuries.