Guernica: the dialogue between Picasso and Dumile Feni

The show is framed inside History Does Not Repeat Itself, but it Does Rhyme, a new series of interventions in the Museo Reina Sofía Collections which involves juxtaposing an equivalent of Guernica from another time or geopolitical sphere, an endeavour contextualised through academic work rooted in art history as an interpretive framework.

View of exhibition History Doesn’t Repeat Itself, but It Does Rhyme. Dumile Feni: African Guernica in room 205 of Museo Reina Sofía, March, 2026. Photografic archive of Museo Reina Sofía. 

Curated by Tamar Garb, a professor of Art History at University College London, Picasso’s emblematic work is juxtaposed with African Guernica, a work by artist Dumile Feni (Worcester, South Africa, 1942 – New York, 1991), who was a key figure in African modernity.

The Museo Reina Sofía sets in motion a programme of exhibitions which, entitled History Doesn’t Repeat Itself, but it Does Rhyme, seeks to initiate a dialogue with Pablo Picasso’s Guernica (1937) and other major works which reveal parallels in their modes of representation or thematic concerns, despite hailing from different historical and cultural contexts.

The series title refers to a phrase which, although traditionally attributed to the writer Mark Twain, is apocryphal and never actually appears in work by the American author. In this opening show, curated by Tamar Garb, Picasso’s emblematic work is juxtaposed with African Guernica, a work by artist Dumile Feni (Worcester, South Africa, 1942 – New York, 1991), who was a key figure in African modernity.

Alongside Feni’s monumental drawing are five other works by this artist which arrive from major South African institutions, including the University of Fort Hare, the Norval Foundation and the Wits Art Museum, in addition to private collections. Furthermore, they are displayed with four of Picasso’s preparatory drawings from Guernica, works which are part of the Museo Reina Sofía Collections.

Dumile Feni, You Wouldn’t Know God if he Spat in your Eye, 1975, detail. Ink, pencil, crayon, plastic laminate, 26 × 5.300 cm. Wits Art Museo Collection, Johannesburg. ©Estate Dumile Feni and Dumile Feni Family Trust 

As Museo Reina Sofía director, Manuel Segade, explained: “African Guernica represents a significant time in the crisis of modernity, the time of Apartheid in South Africa, one of the limits of the modern project”. Meanwhile, the show’s curator, Tamar Garb, was keen to stress how Dumile Feni “is a modern artist who used drawing materials on an almost unprecedented scale worldwide at that time”. “If we observe drawing practices globally in the 1960s, very few artists worked on such an epic, monumental scale as Dumile in that period”, she added.

MUSMA – Museum of Contemporary Sculpture celebrates its 20th anniversary and presents its 2026 programme of activities

On March 20, 2026, Matera marks a significant moment as it officially begins its journey as Mediterranean Capital of Culture and Dialogue. Within this same context, MUSMA launches the celebrations for its twentieth anniversary, a milestone that not only retraces two decades of museum activity, but also looks to the future by adopting “wind” as a metaphor for transformation, regeneration, and rebirth.

Hunting Room. © Pierangelo Laterza

Within this framework, Cambiamento (Change) takes shape as a project aimed at reactivating the museum’s permanent collection. The works are not regarded as static entities, but as living organisms, capable of engaging with the present and generating new interpretations and meanings. The intervention is not conceived as a simple restoration, but rather as a process of restoring vitality, placing the installations in direct dialogue with our time.

The project unfolds across three levels of intervention—material, conceptual, and spatial—and involves the artists Alberto Timossi, Agnese Purgatorio, and Giovanni Gaggia, invited to carry out a creative regeneration of the works. Their contributions go beyond merely updating existing pieces; instead, they stimulate their evolution, producing layers of meaning and building a bridge between the museum space and collective memory.

Hypogeum

The dialogue is further expanded through the collaboration with Moroccan artist Hassan Echair who, in synergy with MOON in Potenza and Biblioteca Errante, will create the Babelic Atlas dedicated to Tétouan. Together with Matera, Tétouan will be one of the two cities at the center of the Mediterranean Capital of Culture and Dialogue. For five days, the artist will be in residence in Matera, moving through the city and gathering traces, impressions, and materials for the creation of the work. At the end of the residency, Echair will leave a tangible trace of his presence within MUSMA, establishing a direct connection between the artist, the city, and the museum.

Alongside this project, an unpublished sculpture by Carlo Levi, on loan from his Foundation, interprets the Mediterranean as a space where separation and connection coexist: Ritratto di donna (Portrait of a Woman) becomes a symbol of collective identity, freedom, and the complexity of the modern world.

A further significant element is the exhibition of the Lagorio Collection, which interweaves ideas, eras, and cultures into a continuous artistic narrative. As an integral part of the permanent collection, the museum will acquire new artists and works from the Lagorio family, to rethink MUSMA as a space where memory is constantly regenerated through new artistic perspectives.

Pasquale Santoro, Gate for Antonello da Messina e Mauro Staccioli, Ring. © Luca Centola

From September to December 2026, MUSMA will host the temporary exhibition Nanni Valentini. Face and Place, dedicated to the material heads and faces shaped by Nanni Valentini. The works will enter into dialogue with Il Focolare, a piece belonging to the museum’s permanent collection, and with the local tuff stone, giving rise to a sensory experience that brings historical material and contemporary experimentation into relation.

The theme of the house, together with that of the hearth, represents the highest point of Nanni Valentini’s artistic reflection on the idea of place. This interweaving celebrates the ability of matter to evoke deep memories, as well as the central role of the face as an element of identity within the collective imagination.

Through these initiatives, MUSMA affirms itself as a living, dynamic, and constantly evolving laboratory. Through Cambiamento, the museum traces an ongoing trajectory between permanence and transformation, between past and future, reflected in the Sassi of Matera and in the stories they hold. A process that places culture at the centre as a living space of dialogue.

GUGLIELMO CASTELLI e FABIO CHERSTICH - Sospeso nel moto con addebito di vuoto

On Saturday, March 21, Sospeso nel moto con addebito di vuoto was inaugurated at the Church of San Carlo in Cremona, a project that brings together installation, painting, and performance within an immersive environment.

The project originates from a nursery rhyme by Guglielmo Castelli, which introduces the central themes of the work: suspension, falling, uncertainty, and the possibility that even error may find its own form. These tensions are translated into a spatial dispositif in which image, sound, and movement converge to shape the experience.

The intervention unfolds as a continuous environment, where a large backdrop rises from the floor, generating a kind of visual limbo. The painted surfaces, traversed by fragile and suspended figures, suggest bodies in descent, evoking Baroque iconographies and dynamics of imbalance. Mobile elements, inspired by the scenic devices of Baroque theatre, introduce further layers of depth and transformation without relying on a traditional perspectival construction.

Guglielmo Castelli’s painting expands beyond the canvas, becoming an integral part of the space and contributing to the definition of an environment that can be physically traversed. Images emerge and dissolve, creating an unstable visual dimension in constant transformation.

During the opening, the installation was activated through a performance entrusted to a string trio and a chorus of performers. The sound, inspired by the tradition of the madrigal and opening toward more contemporary outcomes, moved through the space as a diffuse presence, while the performers inhabited the environment by alternating appearance and withdrawal, in constant dialogue with the architectures and images.

Following the performative activation, the work continues to exist as a walkable installation. Visitors can move freely through the space, engaging directly with the scenic and visual elements. The project thus takes shape as an environmental composition in which the mode of reception is no longer frontal, but experiential and dynamic.

SAN CARLO is an exhibition space dedicated to contemporary art, made possible through the commitment of Lorenzo Spinelli and oriented toward research, production, and cultural exchange. Artistic direction is entrusted to Francesca Minini.