The Willem de Kooning exhibition in Italy will be inaugurated on April 16, 2024, coinciding with the 60th International Art Exhibition of the Venice Biennale and will remain open until September 15, 2024.

As announced today, September 20, 2023, during the press conference held at the Gallerie dell’Accademia in the presence of the director of the galleries Giulio Manieri Elia, the exhibition will be the first to investigate the importance of de Kooning's stays in Italy, dating back to 1959 and 1969. The curators, Gary Garrels and Mario Codognato, will delve into, for the first time, the influence of the trips to Italy on the artist's subsequent paintings, drawings, and sculptures created in America.

The exhibition, designed in collaboration with the UNA/FWR Associati studio led by architect Giulia Foscari, will bring together about 75 works including paintings, sculptures, and drawings, spanning four decades of de Kooning's art, from the 1950s to the 1980s, creating the most comprehensive exhibition of the artist ever organized in Italy. The first room will include a selection of Black and White Rome, large and extraordinary drawings made by William de Kooning during his first, long visit to the capital in 1959. The drawings will be exhibited alongside works from the late 1950s, created before the artist's first visit to Italy: the Parkway Landscape paintings reveal the strength of his work around the mid-twentieth century.