The Galleria dell’Accademia di Firenze presents the exhibition Controcanto, an evocative dialogue between the feminine universe of the Florentine artist Daniela De Lorenzo and the portraits of the nineteenth-century sculptor Lorenzo Bartolini. The exhibition will be inaugurated on November 25th, on the occasion of the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women, and will be open from November 26th to January 6th, 2025.

The Controcanto exhibition was born as an OFF event of the festival L’Eredità delle donne, the event dedicated to female empowerment that enhances the past and present contribution of women in the various fields of knowledge. The exhibition, now in its seventh edition, this year is dedicated to the figure of Anna Maria Luisa de’ Medici (1667-1743) and to the female generations of the future, as can be seen from the theme “FUTURE” – a play on words that simultaneously refers to the women of the future and to the future in their hands, reading it in English.

The exhibition proposes a visual encounter between ten female busts by the sculptor Lorenzo Bartolini (1777-1850) and the project that Daniela De Lorenzo (1959) created for the occasion. A journey that explores the aesthetic interaction between the nineteenth-century women portrayed by Bartolini and the studies of the Florentine artist on the female body – making use of photography, video sculpture and installations.

The title of the exhibition is inspired by the photographic work of the same name by Daniela De Lorenzo (2004/2024). A self-portrait that, through a sudden movement of the head in front of the photographic lens at the moment of the shot, transforms the snapshot into a dilated, suspended time, thus rethinking the very concept of self-portrait through the cancellation of some elements of personal identity.

The exhibition will be open until January 6th, 2025 during the opening hours of the Galleria dell’Accademia – from 8.15 am to 6.50 pm (last admission 6.20 pm) – and will be included in the ticket price.