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The exhibitions not to be missed this autumn
From Picasso to Munch
September is ‘Back to…’ month: back to school and work, but also back to lots of opportunities to visit the exhibitions that inaugurate this season in the city.
We have compiled a list for you of the exhibitions inaugurated this autumn that are absolutely not to be missed: from Picasso to Munch, discover them here.
Following the recently-concluded The metamorphosis of the figure Picasso exhibition at MUDEC - Museum of Cultures, which opened our eyes to the great Spanish artist’s knowledge of primitive, African, Egyptian, Greek art, another exhibition on Picasso is inaugurated at Palazzo Reale.
Picasso the Foreigner, from September 20th, 2024 to February 2nd 2025, investigates a yet unstudied aspect of the artist's life and production: the unease of being a foreigner and not being accepted in France, his adopted land.
Born in Malaga, Spain in 1881, Picasso settled in Paris in 1904, becoming one of the most important artists of the century. He never obtained French citizenship and, as a foreigner, he experienced endless difficulties, such as being monitored by the police because he was registered as an anarchist, and being obliged to present himself to the authorities every two years to provide his fingerprints.
Over 80 works are on display, together with documents, letters, photographs and videos that make us reflect on the themes of welcome, immigration and relationships with others. Being ‘the foreigner’ shaped Picasso's identity, and forces us to reflect on the realities of today's world.
Palazzo Reale
From €13 to €17
How to get there: M1 red underground line and M3 yellow line, Duomo stop
For many he is one of the founding fathers of modern painting, widely admired as the author of one of the most famous works in the world that is so well-known as to be reproduced in Lego: The Scream. He is Munch, the Norwegian painter who managed to represent human unease with his art.
On the occasion of the 80th anniversary of his demise, Palazzo Reale dedicates the Munch. The Inner Cry exhibition to the artist, from September 14th, 2024 to January 26th, 2025. Over 100 masterpieces from the Munch Museum in Oslo lead us on a journey through his art which conveys sensations and feelings, also the result of the knowledge of the psychological studies that were gaining traction at the time.
The anxiety, inner loneliness and mal de vivre become almost palpable in his gazeless figures, in the fragile and symbolic landscapes, in the sound waves of the scream that become brushstrokes of colour around a deformed face. The exhibition invites us to discover the artist’s personal life and the various phases of his career, to get to know one of the fathers of Expressionism more profoundly.
Palazzo Reale
From € 13 to € 17
How to get there: underground red line M1 and yellow line M3, Duomo stop
Ugo Mulas, one of the most important photographers of the post-World War II period, captured images that gifted his audience a critical testimony of contemporary society.
Commencing from Brera, the artists' district of Milano, his camera immortalized the greatest 20th-century artists such as Max Ernst, Giacometti, Mirò, Morandi, Pasolini, up to the great Americans Frank Stella, Roy Lichtenstein, Jasper John and Robert Rauschenberg.
He dedicated an entire collection to Eugenio Montale's Ossi di seppia (Cuttlefish Bones) creating an evocative photo for each poem, even surprising Montale himself with his ability to grasp the essence of each composition.
The over 300 photographs on display narrate Mulas' entire career, including his work in fashion with Mila Schön, the world of theatre with Strehler, the story of industry with his work on Olivetti, Pirelli, Bormioli, and the Italian economic boom.
Explore the history of the last century through the eyes of a unique photographer.
Palazzo Reale
From € 13 to € 17
How to get there: underground red line M1 and yellow line M3, Duomo stop
Enter the colourful and fascinating world of Niki De Saint Phalle, the French-American artist, famous in Italy above all for the Tarot Garden open-air museum between Garavicchio and Capalbio in Tuscany.
The 110 works on display at Mudec - Museum of Cultures from October 5th 2024 to February 16th, 2025 narrate her artistic life, from her beginnings to latest works, in a journey that revisits the ‘destructive’ works created to exorcise the demons of childhood, combined with the colours and materials through which she expressed her identity, her femininity, sensuality and love for life as creation.
The famous Nanas, rounded, colourful and polymorphic female figures that attract attention in collections all over the world, are on display alongside an elegant selection of clothes from the Maison Dior, which recall her past as a model portrayed in the beautiful photographic shots, which at the same time narrate a very “pop” personal vision of art. Painter, sculptor, author of experimental films with a zest for life, Niki De Saint Phalle is a multifaceted artist to be discovered.
A large monumental work welcomes visitors on the exterior, acting as a door that leads into this fantastic world full of ideas and significance.
Mudec - Museum of Cultures
From € 8 to € 16
How to get there: M2 Green underground line, S. Agostino stop; tram 14 Piazza del Rosario stop; bus 68, 90/91
After Niki De Saint Phalle, we cannot fail to include the unmissable exhibition dedicated to Nouveau Réalist Jean Tinguely, her personal and artistic life partner.
“For me, art is a form of manifest revolt, total and complete”: is what Tinguely said. For this reason, his most famous works are the Useless Machines, built with waste materials that form mythological and ancestral figures, noisy and cacophonous functioning machines equipped with real engines.
The exhibition of more than thirty works at Pirelli HangarBicocca is the largest retrospective held in Italy since the artist's death: the monumental Useless Machines are juxtaposed with kinetic and colourful works.
It is an opportunity to reflect on the artist's idea of museum and the ‘anti-museum’, and at the same time evokes Tinguely's atelier-factory in La Verrerie, in the Swiss canton of Friborg.
Pirelli HangarBicocca
Free entry
How to get there: metro line M5 Lilla Ponale stop then bus 51 (direction Cimiano M2) stop Via Chiese – HangarBicocca
A highly-anticipated project arrives at Fondazione Prada this autumn: from October 31st the Moroccan artist Meriem Bennani will present a new commission, composed of a large mechanical installation and an unreleased animated film.
The installation animates hundreds of second-hand objects in a chaotic ‘ballet’, a hypnotic display of movement and sound. It is intended to represent a metaphor for the complexity and interconnectedness of our contemporary world, highlighting the often-overlooked emotional narratives embedded in everyday objects.
The original feature film, directed by Orian Barki and produced by John Michael Boling and Jason Coombs, is set in a world populated by anthropomorphic animals, and is suspended between realism, autobiography and fiction. Bennani accordingly weaves together elements of her personal experiences with broader cultural and political themes, bridging the personal and the universal, and she invites viewers to reflect on their own position within society.
Prada Foundation
How to get there: subway line M3 Lodi T.I.B.B. stop; tram 24; bus 65
