At the beginning of the new millennium, the passion for contemporary art induced Annamaria and Antonio Maccaferri to start their own collection.
Right from the outset, they showed a preference for photography, over the years putting together an extremely rich and varied collection, ranging from the concentrated poetic of Luigi Ghirri to the monumentality of Thomas Ruff, and from the conceptual rigueur of Joachim Schmid and Linda Fregni Nagler to the aesthetic research of Frank Thiel. Their choice of artists and works has always been guided by a strong emotional response, added to which an affinity of tastes has led the two collectors to mutually agree on the purchases to be made. One part of their collection is dedicated to a specific theme: vertigo. A few rooms of their home have been dedicated to this. The strong aesthetic and emotional experience on entering is enhanced by a special site-specific work commissioned of an Italian artist based in New York, Francesco Simeti: wallpaper extending several dozens of square metres over all four walls of the room to surround a crystal staircase.
Convinced that artists and collectors must collaborate, the Maccaferris have over the years supported the production of works and entire exhibitions of artists they are particularly close to, such as the videomaker duo MASBEDO.
On the occasion of Arte Fiera 2019 and the complete overhaul of the photography section - curated by the Fantom platform and now open to video works, hence its new name “Photography and Moving Images” - Annamaria and Antonio Maccaferri have contributed with an acquisition award. The work selected will become part of their collection.
Together with his brothers, entrepreneur Antonio Maccaferri directs Gruppo Industriale Maccaferri, a company with offices in practically all countries of the world. One of the group’s best-known activities is Manifatture Sigaro Toscano.
Annamaria Maccaferri combines her activity as an artist with that of an entrepreneur in the communications sector.
ACQUISITION AND MOTIVATION
The jury acknowledged the very high quality of the Photography and Images in Movement Section, which presented innovative and experimental works especially from Italian and young artists. For this reason, the first prize goes to I Pilastri della Terra, 2019 by Virginia Zanetti – Galleria Traffic – for her light original touch in dealing with the urgent topical issues like environmental awareness, while tying for the second prize were Mushroom from the forest #1, 2011 by Takashi Homma – Galleria Viasaterna - and The Google Trilogy – 1. Report a problem, 2012 by Emilio Vavarella - Galleriapiù. The jury recognized the refined conceptual language used by the former when considering environmental questions, in this case highly dramatic issues; and the latter artist’s intelligent use of the web to develop a photographic corpus concerned with a long virtual voyage to show up and highlight error with great chromatic and visual impact.