Felice Levini

Hypermaremma is excited to unveil the second major project of this 2023 edition: Dal Giorno alla Notte, a site-specific installation conceived by artist Felice Levini for the exceptional setting of the Parco Archeologico dell’Antica Città di Cosa, in Ansedonia.

Dal Giorno alla Notte tells the story of the ancient colony founded by the Romans on top of the hill of Ansedonia in 273 B.C. after the conquest of Vulci and the neighbouring Etruscan territories. Combining mythology and symbolism, Felice Levini conceives a metaphysical scenario among the archaeological ruins and the remains of Roman temples, imagining a multitude of divine signals that, like thunderbolts, indicate unequivocally to the conquerors the place sacred to the gods.

The artist recovers, with his work, the entanglement of life and religion that was typical of the Roman world, characterised by the endless waiting for divine signals. Twelve fire-red cyclopean arrows stab the ground of the Archaeological Park. Along with the arrows, stone slabs appear scattered among the ruins of the temples, evoking the names of the twelve main Roman divinities: Apollo, Ceres, Diana, Jupiter, Juno, Mars, Mercury, Minerva, Neptune, Venus, Vesta, and Vulcan. Sudden appearances that reveal themselves to the people of Rome without warning “from day to night”. The images that spring from Felice Levini’s research compose a symbolic and ironic code that makes the contamination of languages, grafting and lucidity its stylistic hallmark. In the contrasts, decompositions and reversals, his work is continually renewed, generating unusual meanings, thus revealing unprecedented spaces of interpretation. The artist casually draws from literature, mythology, nature as well as from his most intimate and personal sphere.

With this installation by Felice Levini, Hypermaremma is returning for the third time to one of the most special places in the Tuscan Maremma. After having launched the collective exhibition ‘La Città Sommersa’ in 2019 and after having presented the performance ‘The City of Thing’ and the sculpture ‘Otto Doppio Cono con Maschera’ by Francesco Cavaliere in 2022, a new site-specific work will once again make the Parco Archeologico dell’Antica Città di Cosa the protagonist.

Critic text by Massimo Belli.

Courtesy Galleria d’Arte Niccoli, Parma.

In collaboration with the Director of the Archaeological Area Susanna Sarti and the Regional Museums Directorate of Tuscany. Thanks to Travertino Pacifici and Monteverro Wines.

Patronage of Comune di Orbetello and Rai Toscana.