Serena Vestrucci

Delving into the interstice of everyday experience and inspiring by unexpected encounters with common objects, the works of Serena Vestrucci (Milan, 1986) interrogate and transform the ordinary via a diverse range of artistic processes and language impositions. Fascinated by artifacts, situations, images, and materials from the everyday (like flags, crayons, fried calamari, seasonal fruits), the artist turns these elements into the subject and the feedstock of her artistic experience. By altering and shifting them to spheres of action different from their original context, Vestrucci focalizes on these elements, transforming their appearances and filling them with new connotations, in an instantaneous and illusory poetic, barely visible and yet only apparently simple. The outcome are works that, in their visual immediacy, overturn the perception of the artwork, modifying its semantic value and inviting the viewer to reimagine how we observe and interpret the surroundings. Imbued with a subtle irony toward contemporaneity, Vestrucci’s works probe the obviousness of small things, giving voice to what is often hidden, forgotten or sidelined. Through a playful, yet direct and provocative language, the artist elevates the ambiguity to a foundational element for a more accurate understanding of reality.

After graduating with a bachelor’s degree from the Brera Academy of Fine Arts, she moved to Venice, where she earned a master’s degree in Visual Arts at the IUAV University of Venice.

Selected solo exhibitions include: Renata Fabbri, Milan (2021); Gallery of Modern Art, Verona (2017); Archaeological Museum Antonio Salinas, Palermo (2017); Marsèlleria Permanent Exhibition, Milan (2016); Villa Croce Museum of Contemporary Art, Genoa (2015); and Otto Zoo Gallery, Milan (2013). Her work has been featured in group shows at Stefan Gierowski Foundation, Warsaw (2022); Made in Cloister Foundation, Naples (2022); Imago Mundi Foundation, Treviso (2021); Pastificio Cerere Foundation, Rome (2020); Villa Croce Museum of Contemporary Art, Genoa (2020 and 2015); Palazzo Del Medico, Carrara (2020); Michetti Foundation Museum, Francavilla al Mare, Chieti (2020); Casa Testori, Novate Milanese (2019); Blitz, Valletta, Republic of Malta (2019); Italian Cultural Institute, New York (2018); Italian Cultural Institute, London (2018); Santa Maria della Scala Museum, Siena (2018); Palazzo Reale, Milan (2017 and 2015); Bevilacqua La Masa Foundation, Venice (2017, 2012 and 2010); FRISE Künstlerhaus, Hamburg, (2014); Casa Masaccio, San Giovanni Valdarno (2014); Sandretto Re Rebaudengo Foundation, Turin (2014); GAM Gallery of Modern Art, Milan (2012); Venetian Institute of Sciences, Humanities and Arts, Venice (2012); and Stedelijk Museum, The Netherlands (2011). In 2017 she won the 18th edition of Premio Cairo and she was selected by the City of Milan to conceive and produce a permanent work in the frame of the public art commission ArtLine Milano.