Magdalena Abakanowicz (Falenty, 1930 – Varsavia, 2017)
Magdalena Abakanowicz was invited by Giuliano Gori to work at Celle after he saw her solo exhibition at the Polish Pavilion during the 1980 Venice Biennale. However, it was only in January 1985 that the artist managed to obtain a visa to leave Poland. Over the course of ten months living with the Gori family, she faced the challenge of creating, for the first time, a permanent artwork in the landscape, a task that would forever change her way of working. With “Katarsis”, she used bronze for the first time and established an operational presence in Italy, creating her sculptures at the Venturi Foundry in Bologna. In 2000, following the relocation of her foundry activities to Poland, on the advice of Giuliano Gori, she made an important donation of artworks to the MART in Rovereto. That same year, she held a solo exhibition titled “Working process e non solo” at Casapeppe in Celle.
