With Graffiti, Museion is presenting a groundbreaking exhibition on the connections between graffiti and contemporary art until September 14, 2025. For the first time in Italy, a museum exhibition is dedicated to the history of spray painting and the diverse artistic transfers of the visual languages of the city and street into the studio. Graffiti is shown above all as a viewpoint and perspective on urban landscapes. Across 1,500 square meters on the two upper floors of the museum, the exhibition brings together key works from the mid-20th century to the present day as well as new, site-specific works.
The exhibition brings together transdisciplinary works from 70 years and pursues an approach that goes far beyond the historicization of graffiti as an "outsider" practice. Starting with early spray paintings from the 1950s and 1960s, it spans an arc from works by legendary graffiti writers of the 1980s to works by contemporary artists who incorporate graffiti into their diverse oeuvre.
Spray paint, the characteristic tool of modern graffiti, was patented in the USA in 1951. Almost two decades passed between its market launch in the 1950s and the emergence of the form of graffiti we know today in the late 1960s, but visual artists were already experimenting with the medium. Since spray paint has become the dominant means of expression for graffiti, it is automatically associated with this art form. Today, even a simple line of spray paint on canvas immediately evokes associations with rebellion and urban culture.
KAYA (Kerstin Brätsch & Debo Eilers), installation view Curated by N.O.Madski - KAYA V (Kerstin Brätsch / Debo Eilers), Meyer Kainer, Vienna, 2015 Photo: Ulrich Holz. Courtesy of the artists, Meyer Kainer, Vienna, and Deborah Schamoni
Graffiti begins with works from the 1950s and 1960s by artists such as Hedda Sterne, David Smith, Martin Barré, Dan Christensen, Carol Rama and Charlotte Posenenske. Canvases by legendary graffiti writers such as Rammellzee, Futura 2000, Blade and Lee Quiñones enter into a dialog with these works. Significant works from the 1980s and 1990s, in which graffiti and contemporary art are combined - including works by Lady Pink & Jenny Holzer, Martin Wong & LA2 and Keith Haring - are followed by more recent spray paintings by Heike-Karin Föll, Michael Krebber and Christopher Wool. Digital graffiti drawings by Georgie Nettell meet Patricia L. Boyd's photogram of a bus stop and Karin Sander's utility pictures, among others. This part of the exhibition also includes works by contemporary graffiti artists such as Kunle Martins and WANTO as well as new works by N.O.Madski in dialog with sculptures by KAYA.
Keith Haring, Untitled, 1983, Centraal Museum Utrecht Collection Photo: Gert Jan van Rooij. Keith Haring artwork © Keith Haring Foundation
Finally, the exhibition is transformed into an urban landscape, populated by works that reflect the rough and creative sides of urban realities in a variety of ways. Graffiti appears as material in films and photographs, such as those by Charles Atlas and Manuel DeLanda, as well as in expansive installations and sculptures. Josephine Pryde's New Media Express, a model train sprayed with graffiti, moves between Klara Lidén's readymade garbage cans and distribution boxes. Other methods of marking urban surfaces can be found in R.I.P. Germain's sculptural reproduction of a shop window front, a new wall installation by Matias Faldbakken and the street casts by Alix Vernet.
Graffiti marks the beginning of a new, long-term Museion research line focusing on soft and non-violent forms of resistance and art as a social and urban practice.
The exhibition is co-curated by New York-based artist and archivist Ned Vena (*1982 in Boston, USA). His artistic practice encompasses painting, sculpture, installation and film and is characterized by his active work as a graffiti writer and his extensive research into the history of graffiti. Conversely, his intensive study of the history of painting has also influenced his understanding of graffiti. The exhibition reflects not only his personal commitment to these interfaces, but also his interdisciplinary archival knowledge.
March 29 to September 14, 2025
www.museion.it
Klara Lidén, Disco, 2020, Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam, gift of Sadie Coles HQ, London. Klara Lidén Photo: Robert Glowacki. Courtesy the Artist and Sadie Coles HQ, London
