Rebecca Horn: Cutting Through the Past

Castello di Rivoli Museo d’Arte Contemporanea presents “Rebecca Horn: Cutting Through the Past”, the first Italian museum retrospective of the late artist, curated by Marcella Beccaria. The exhibition follows her 2024 solo show at Haus der Kunst, Munich, and celebrates her lasting impact on contemporary art.

Through over 35 works—installations, sculptures, films, and rarely seen drawings—the show explores Horn’s fusion of the mechanical and human. Her work delves into themes of time, memory, desire, and power, anticipating today’s cultural and technological concerns.

Highlights include kinetic sculptures like “Peacock Machine” (1982), large-scale installations such as “Inferno” (1993–2024) and “Concert for Anarchy” (2006), and early performances presented as large-scale projections. The exhibition also features “Cutting Through the Past” (1992–1993) and “Miroir du Lac” (2004).

A central focus is Horn’s drawings, from early works to her late “Bodylandscapes”, where circular motifs symbolise time and regeneration. These are shown alongside “The Wheel of Time” (2016), marking the first museum presentation of this spiritual work.

Works also appear at the Cerruti Collection in the “Interferenze” series, including the self-playing “Cello” (1999), originally shown in Concert for Buchenwald.

Director Francesco Manacorda honours Horn’s deep connection with Castello di Rivoli, where she first exhibited in 1984. Curator Marcella Beccaria notes Horn’s prescient blend of mediums and ideas that resonate across disciplines.