Originally conceived in 2002 as a collaboration with the iconic fashion photographer Francesco Scavullo, Francesco by Francesco investigates the artist’s long-standing fascination with self-representation, glamour, and the performative construction of identity.
More than twenty years later, this exhibition reintroduces the same body of work — a series of photographic self-portraits and embroidered “crying” portraits that elevate the most glamorous Divas of the 1980s (from Jacqueline Bisset to Christopher Reeve, from Lauren Hutton and top model Kim Alexis to the most gender bending icons of Andy Warhol’s factory) — inviting viewers to rediscover the artist’s early reflections on image, transformation, and the fragile pain of desire.
In Back to the Mirror, the artist once again confronts his own gaze, through a “red-carpet-esque” installation (designed by Filippo Bisagni), revealing how the language of beauty and celebrity endures as a timeless stage for the art of self-invention.
“What is glamour if not the possibility of living many different lives and experiencing many different universes? Glamour is the miracle of continuously reinventing your persona, transforming yourself into infinite desirable others. Movies, fashion, and the work of Francesco Vezzoli do exactly this.” – Stefano Tonchi
