The project Cimitero Pasolini by Spanish artist and academic Ricard Huerta, presented at Galleria Studio Cenacchi in October and November 2023, opens on Friday 6 October at 6 pm.

Known for his multidisciplinary approach, the artist presents the latest—though not final—chapter of a broader research project that brings into dialogue monumental cemeteries around the world and intellectual figures connected to the cities hosting each iteration. The Bologna chapter (following the one dedicated to Palma de Mallorca and the philosopher Ramon Llull in 2022) establishes a connection between the Monumental Cemetery of Certosa and the writer, filmmaker and intellectual Pier Paolo Pasolini, born 101 years ago in Bologna’s Santo Stefano district, just a short distance from the gallery.

Huerta, author of the essay Cementerios para educar (2021), which explores cemeteries as places of memory, culture and learning, aims through this project to bring citizens closer to the rich cultural heritage these sites represent—through art, writing, and the involvement of universities and schools.

The exhibition Cimitero Pasolini is structured in three complementary sections:

– Ricard Huerta’s artistic intervention, consisting of over twenty photographs taken within the Certosa Monumental Cemetery, alongside an equal number of watercolour works on paper inspired by Pasolini’s writing;

– a participatory artistic project involving contributions from students, academic staff and university personnel from the University of Bologna, invited to submit photographs of cemeteries meaningful to them, accompanied by short texts. A selection of these images is presented in the exhibition as printed works;

– online contributions disseminating the artistic and educational project through the MOdE website (Museo Officina dell’Educazione, a digital museum dedicated to collecting, cataloguing and presenting material and immaterial expressions of educational culture).

The watercolours exhibited in the gallery, alongside photographs of the Certosa Cemetery, are directly inspired by Pasolini’s poem Morte di un fanciullo, included in his collection Poesie (April 1945). The poem is dedicated to Giuseppe Favret, a child from Casarsa della Delizia who died at the age of nine in the summer of 1944.

“A cemetery is a typographic delicacy” (op. cit., p. 196): this is the image Huerta uses to describe one of the central reasons for his fascination with these places.

It is precisely these typographic signs—of every possible kind—that are evoked in the artist’s watercolours. Each work incorporates a passage from Pasolini’s poem, but not only this: within the coloured backgrounds, one can discern additional graphic elements, which Huerta disperses poetically across the surface, creating a kind of contemporary graphic–chromatic narrative.

The aspiration underlying this complex and original project reflects Huerta’s longstanding intention: to deepen public awareness of the monumental cemeteries of each city in which the project is presented—exploring all their facets—and, at the same time, to foster a renewed engagement with a significant local intellectual figure.

In this case, the resonance between Pasolini’s poetics—particularly Morte di un fanciullo—Huerta’s works, and the Monumental Cemetery of Certosa in Bologna could not be more evident.