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The marino marini
[Emily Clarck]
Hidden in between the ancient architecture and renaissance art is Museum Marino Marini, is the only contemporary art museum in Florence.The museum ironically is located in the the building of San Pancrazio, one of the oldest in Florence and once a church.
Entering the building, the differentiated levels attract different angles of natural light to each floor of the museum. The variety of levels and angles is parallel to the work of Marino Marini, whose sculptures take on a different form and meaning as the observer makes his way around it.
The spacious nature and the freedom to roam freely between levels astonished me because in the traditional Florentine museums a patrolling security guard is located in front of every door and every painting.
I found the freedom to be beneficial while observing this ambiguous exhibit. It allowed me to take the time and walk slowly around every sculpture and try to interpret it for myself. After the initial shock about the freedom to roam around the museum, I was immediately drawn to the dates of each painting and sculpture. Contemporary to me consists of the last decade so it was necessary to try and get a grip on what exactly constituted as contemporary in such a historical city. The dates that I documented ranged from 1930’s until the 1970’s.
After an understanding of the time period in which Marini created majority of his works I began to notice that a similarity existed in Marini’s art. All of the sculptures showed movement, all attempted to depict some type of human form, and many were of man on horseback. The abstract nature of the sculptures, and paintings, which were no more than premature sketches of the sculptures, was confirmed because none of the figures have a detailed face.
The bulk of Marini’s paintings were constructed in a time of war so it is no surprise that Marini “only believed in the idea that his work comes out of the drama of life,” the drama of life being the disruption of war. This quote tied directly into the images of men on horseback as a common depiction of wartime.
The Museo Marino Marini had a very relaxed feel to it which was a nice break from all the Renaissance museums, however, the lack of detail in the work and repetition of structures and images still left me wondering the significance behind majority of his work.
MARINO MARINI BIO
Born in Pistoia in 1901, Marino studied sculpture at the Academy of Fine Arts in Florence. In 1938 he married Mercedes Pedrazzini. The outbreak of war in 1940 greatly upset Marino, now teaching at the Brera in Milan. Many of his works were lost when his studio and flat were bombed in 1942. He and his wife fled to Switzerland in the same year, remaining there until the end of the war. They returned to Milan in 1948. He died in Viareggio in 1979 and was buried in Pistoia.
Marino’s
subject matter
We can find three main themes in Marino Marini’s art: his Pomona figures, his horses and riders and his portraits. These are all recurring subjects that he continued to represent throughout his life. As he said “it doesn’t matter what it represents, but how it is represented”.
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