Università Roma Tre

Reading Self-Portrait by Carla Lonzi
The publication of the book Autoritratto marked the high point and conclusion of Carla Lonzi's professional activity as an art critic. Fifty-five years after its first release, and on the occasion of its republication as part of an extensive reissue of the art critic and feminist's writings, this course offers an updated and in-depth reading of a capital text of 20th-century Italian art criticism.
The book is the result of the editing of a series of conversations in which an exceptionally intelligent art critic and some of the leading artists working in Italy in the 1960s are brought together in an imaginary “banquet.” Carla Accardi, Getulio Alviani, Enrico Castellani, Pietro Consagra, Luciano Fabro, Lucio Fontana, Jannis Kounellis, Mario Nigro, Giulio Paolini, Pino Pascali, Mimmo Rotella, Salvatore Scarpitta, Giulio Turcato; completing the group was Cy Twombly, who Lonzi's (written) questions had never been answered.
The conversations had been recorded over the previous years, some intended from the outset for publication in a magazine or exhibition catalog, others remained unpublished, and still others caught in the context of sharing of ideas among friends. The informal nature of the conversations means that everything is talked about in the book, that the artists are questioned more often on a personal level than on a professional one, as it is also evident from the illustrative set, composed largely of photographs from family albums.

_ C. Lonzi, Autoritratto, in any edition: De Donato, Bari 1969; et al. edizioni, Milano 2010; Abscondita, Milano 2017; La Tartaruga, Milano 2024. The book has been translated in French (Autoportrait, JRP | Ringier, Paris 2012), English (Self-portrait, Divided Publishing, Bruxelles 2021) and German (Selbstbildnis, Gachnang & Springer, Bern 2000).

_ L. Conte, “La critica è potere”. Percorsi e momenti della critica negli anni Sessanta, in L. Conte, V. Fiorino (a cura di), La duplice radicalità: Carla Lonzi dalla critica militante al femminismo di Rivolta, ETS, Pisa 2011, pp. 87-109.
_ L. Iamurri, Intorno a Autoritratto: fonti, ipotesi, riflessioni, ivi, pp. 67-86.
_ L. Iamurri, Un margine che sfugge. Carla Lonzi e l’arte in Italia, 1955-1970, Quodlibet, Macerata 2016.
_ T. Kittler, Reimaging the Family Album: Carla Lonzi’s Autoritratto, in F. Ventrella, G. Zapperi (eds), Feminism and Art in Postwar Italy. The Legacy of Carla Lonzi, Bloomsbury, London 2020, pp. 181-208.

Since a written paper is required for the exam, additional specific bibliography may be required. This will be indicated on a case-by-case basis in relation to the topic of the paper.