Hands - Earth - Light - Colors

Giuseppe Penone was born in Garessio, Italy in 1947. Long related to developments in sculpture in the 60s and 70s, and to Arte Povera, Penone’s work retains its own distinctive character incorporating binary meanings related to the natural world and the notion of living sculpture.  Penone’s interest in the space between the hand and the touched surface that becomes sculpture and drawing, between imprint and sight, gesture and action, has been sustained throughout his body of work.  

Giuseppe Penone has had recent solo exhibitions at the Galleria Borghese, Rome (2023); Centre Pompidou, Paris (2022); Philadelphia Museum of Art (2022); Villa Medici, Rome (2021); Palais d'léna - CESE, Paris, France (2019); Yorkshire Sculpture Park, Wakefield, UK (2018); Chateau La Coste, Le Puy-Sainte-Réparade (2017); Palazzo della Civilità, Rome (2017); Louvre Abu Dhabi, UAE (2017); MART, Rovereto (2016); Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam (2016); Nasher Sculpture Center, Dallas (2015); Musée Cantonal des Beaux-Arts, Lausanne, Switzerland (2015);  the Beirut Art Center, Lebanon (2014); the Musée de

Grenoble, France (2014); the Château de Versailles, France (2013); Kunstmuseum Winterthur (2013); Madison Square Park, New York (2013) and Whitechapel Gallery, London (2013).

In 2023 Penone became a Foreign Associate Member of the Académie des Beaux-Arts. Among his many awards he recently received the McKim Medal (2017) and the prestigious Praemium Imperiale International Arts Award for Sculpture in 2014. Giuseppe Penone has exhibited at Documenta V (1972), VII (1982), VIII (1987) and XIII (2012) and at the Venice Biennale in 2007, 1995, 1986, 1980, and 1978.

Earlier this year The Logic of the Vegetal – Metamorphosis was presented at Desert X AlUla 2024 located in northwest Saudi Arabia. In May 2024, Penone will unveil a new site-specific sculpture commissioned by the Princess Estelle Cultural Foundation for its sculpture park on Royal Djurgåden in celebration of its five-year anniversary.