(Re)exchange the Visit

(Re)exchange the Visit is a project supported by the Fondazione di Comunità Milano, created in collaboration with some of Milan’s leading museums. After offering Casa Testori an exclusive preview in the summer of 2021 for the exhibition CURATELA, these museums are now making one of their works available once again — this time to be shared with the wider community beyond their walls.

OUTWARD JOURNEY

Thanks to the participation of three Municipal Neighborhood Libraries—Valvassori-Peroni, Chiesa Rossa, and Dergano Bovisa—which have long been committed to keeping cultural life vibrant in the city’s outskirts, new and unexpected exhibition spaces have been created. The three artworks presented at Casa Testori are now distributed across these libraries, each displayed for a month in a dedicated showcase.

From Villa Necchi Campiglio – FAI Collection comes Still Life with Hare by Filippo de Pisis, hosted at the first library;
from the Museo del ’900, Hill of Imbersago (1954) by Ennio Morlotti, donated to the City of Milan by Giovanni Testori in 1956, is presented at the Chiesa Rossa Library;
and from Casa Boschi di Stefano comes Flowers (1952) by Giorgio Morandi, exhibited at the Dergano Bovisa Library.

Through educational tools, visitors will be able to deepen their understanding of each painting, and public conversations will be organized within the libraries, giving voice both to the museum directors who loaned the works and to young contemporary artists—Alberto Gianfreda, Fabio Roncato, and the artist duo bn+BRINANOVARA—who already engaged in a dialogue with these masters during the CURATELA exhibition at Casa Testori.

RETURN JOURNEY

Regular library visitors and the local community groups that animate these spaces will in turn “return the visit” by going to the museums from which the artworks originate. They will be offered free admission and a guided tour, allowing them to admire the artworks in their original context—where they are preserved and cared for—and to discover their histories and connections.

The aim is to widen the window opened by encountering a masterpiece displayed in one’s neighborhood library, and to invite the public to take part in the cultural heart of the city.

DISCOVER THE THREE LIBRARIES: