Draft:Gian Ruggero Manzoni

Gian Ruggero Manzoni (born 1957, Lugo, Province of Ravenna) is an Italian painter, poet, and writer. A recognized figurative artist - with associations with Mimmo Paladino and Anselm Kiefer, among those closest to his feelings - Manzoni is a theorist, founder of magazines (from Origini to Ali, to name just two), collaborator of Edoardo Sanguineti and Achille Bonito Oliva. It has crossed the cultural history of the last forty years in Italy. He belongs to a well-known Italian family which includes the famous novelist Alessandro Manzoni among its members.

Education and career
After his enrollment at DAMS (Discipline delle Arti, della Musica e dello Spettacolo, a School of performing arts) at Bologna University, he stayed for long periods in Belgium, France and Germany, where he frequented those artistic environments. In 1980 published, together with his friend Emilio Dalmonte, ''Pesta duro e vai trànquilo. Dizionario della lingua italiana'' with Edizioni Feltrinelli. In 1982 and 1983 Manzoni was editor of the Cervo Volante magazine in Rome, directed by Achille Bonito Oliva (art critic) and Edoardo Sanguineti (poet). Also in 1983 he began a close collaboration with the Roman gallery owner Cleto Polcina. During the same period Manzoni made his first contacts with the artists of the Transavanguardia, in particular with Enzo Cucchi and Mimmo Paladino, with whom he will collaborate on various editorial occasions.

Also in those years he participated as an assistant in two painting courses, in Germany, held by Georg Baselitz. In 1984 he was invited by Maurizio Calvesi and Marisa Vescovo to take part as a poet and artist in the 41st Venice Biennale, where he curated together with the poet Valerio Magrelli the poetry section for “Arte allo Specchio” and, with Giorgio Celli, the New Languages Section for Art and Science. In Italy he met Mario Schifano and in Germany, where he returned to stay, he established contacts with A. R. Penck, Markus Lüpertz, Joseph Beuys, Jörg Immendorff, Martin Disler and Sigmar Polke. These are artists who will influence his work in various ways.

From 1986 to 1998 he directed the art and literature magazine Origini ("Origins", published by La Scaletta) and was responsible for Italy for the German School of Thought Liebe und Aktion, based on the Wandervogel movement. Manzoni met Gino De Dominicis, with whom he spent many hours discussing about anthropology and about the Assyrian and Babylonian cultures, together with Mario Schifano and Amelia Rosselli. Since 1985 he began to theatrically interpret his texts accompanied by jazz musicians such as Fernando Mencherini, Nicola Franco Ranieri, John De Leo, Stefano Scodanibbio, Stefano Vagnini, as well as Salvatore Accardo, one of Italy's greatest living violinists. In 1990 he started to attend the Milan artistic circles and became the supervisor of the cultural pages of the art newspaper RISK, directed by Lucrezia De Domizio Durini. In 1993 he started a collaboration with the publishing house “Il Saggiatore”. Also in the early 90’s he met and started several collaborations with artists such as Aldo Mondino, Giacinto Cerone, Luigi Ontani, Jan Knap, Bruno Ceccobelli and many others, with whom he then collaborated. In 1991 Fernando Mencherini created the music for Manzoni's Il codice (“The Code”). The premiere was in Lugo, with a special performance of Stefano Scodanibbio at the double bass. In the same year he further studied the theories of Gorgia, Hume, Stirner, the Russian nihilists Zaytsev and Pisarev, as well as Nietzsche, Heidegger, Benn, Bakunin, Jungler, Spengler, Carl Schmitt, Camus, Celine and many other modern theorists.

In the following years, under the direction of Gianni Celati, he collaborated on the creation of the poetry magazine Il semplice, published by Feltrinelli. These were the years when he met the German painter Anselm Kiefer. And these were also the years when he entered the editorial group of Letteratura-Tradizione ("Literature-Tradition") (published by Heliopolis) and directed three issues of the paper. Thanks to Matthes & Seitz Verlag, of Munich, in 2000 he published the poetry book Il digiuno imposto, illustrated by Mimmo Paladino.

In 2001 he met Alessandro Scansani, director of the publishing house Diabasis, of which he became author and associate. In 2005 he joined the Scientific Committee for Cultural and Literary Activities of the Camaldoli Monastery. In 2006 he went back to working in the theatre and put on stage some of his monologues accompanied by the singer/vocalist John De Leo. Since 2008 he founded and directed the magazine Ali ("Wings"), published by Bradipo, a four-monthly journal about art and literature. In 2009 he left the Scientific Committee for Cultural and Literary Activities of the Camaldoli Monastery and started working on the translation of the biblical Exodus published by Raffaelli of Rimini. In 2010 he went back to work with the German School of Thought Liebe und Aktion. In 2011 he taught painting and sculpture at the Espace Polychrome in Liège, Belgium. In 2012 he translated the Book of Genesis.

Personal life
Manzoni currently lives in his hometown, Lugo. He has a daughter, who lives in Great Britain.

Awards and achievements
He won several literary awards:
 * 1986: Savignano Poesia Inedita (for an unpublished collection of poems);
 * 1993: Mont Blanc Narrativa Inedita (for unpublished fiction);
 * 1996: Todaro-Faranda Narrativa Inedita (for unpublished fiction);
 * 2002: Confesercenti-Bancarella Narrativa (fiction);
 * 2002: Città di Bari- Costiera di Levante Narrativa
 * 2004: Francesco Serantini Narrativa (for stories set in Romagna)

Expositions
List of the most representative:


 * «Dooks» (collective exhibition). Old port custom house, Marseille, 1983.
 * «Mito e furia» (collective). Senate Palace, Milano, 1983.
 * «Science (verb total) et classicisme (continué)» (collective). Picop Gallery and European Community, Paris and Brussels, 1984.
 * 41st Venice Biennale, 1984.
 * «Faust. Teatro G. Freytag e Case Occupate di Fasanenstrasse». Munich and Berlin, 1985.
 * «Apocalisse Identitaria» (collective). Cleto Polcina Gallery, Rome, 1986.
 * 42nd Venice Biennale, 1986.
 * «Waffe. Magazzini del Porto», Hambourg, 1987.
 * «Il Principio della libertà» (collective). Hirtsch Foundation buildings in Boston, New York and Chicago, 1988.
 * «GRM – Espressione/tradizione/trasgressione». Gian Ferrari Gallery, Milan, 1990.
 * «Risk ad Atene» (collective). Rostand Art Center, Athens, 1993.
 * «Bomber». Michael Werner Gallery, Cologne, 1994.
 * «Gian Ruggero Manzoni, opere recenti». Riposati Gallery, Roma,1995.
 * «Paesaggi Italiani». Enrico Astuni Gallery, Fano, e Tropico del Cancro, Bari, 1999.
 * «GRM». Michael Werner Gallery, Cologne, 1999.
 * «Il patriota esteta». Italian Veterans Association, New York, 2001.
 * «Il digiuno imposto» (with Mimmo Paladino). National Museum of Buenos Aires, Buenos Aires, 2002. Translated in Spanish and distributed in Argentina, Uruguay, Chile and Spain.
 * «Carte recenti». Newspaper library of the Louvre Museum, Paris, 2004.
 * «Gian Ruggero Manzoni». Zentralbibliothek, Zurich, 2007.
 * «Io divinità - Opere su carta». Bookshop of the Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art in Prague, 2008.
 * «L'Arca di Noè fa il diavolo a quattro» (collective). Pharmacy Industry Art Venice, Mestre, 2010.
 * «Twenty Pounds of Therica». Former Convent of SS. Cosma and Damiano, Venice, 2011.
 * «Fine corso» (collective). Espace Polychrome. Namur, Belgium, 2011.


 * «Apokalips» (collective). Pirelli Tower, Palazzo Lombardia, Milan, 2012.
 * «Artistes Italiens sur l'affichage» (collective). Chambre de Commerce Italianne pour la France, Marseille, 2016.
 * «2nd Biennale d'Arte della Croazia». City of Labin Museum, 2016.
 * «L'equilibrio del guerriero». Fortezza di Radicofani, Siena, 2016.

Critics were interested in Manzoni's work: Harald Szeemann, Maurizio Calvesi, Achille Bonito Oliva, Marisa Vescovo, Catherine David, Heinz Ohff, Lucrezia De Domizio Durini, Werner Haftmann, Giovanni Testori and others.

Publications
Gian Ruggero Manzoni has over 45 publications to his credit with publishing houses such as Feltrinelli, Il Saggiatore, Scheiwiller, Sansoni, Diabasis, Moretti & Vitali, Raffaelli, Skirà/Rizzoli, Guaraldi, Matthes & Seitz Verlag (in Germany and for German-speaking countries), Emede (in Argentina and for Spanish-speaking countries), of which 21 are in poems. Some of his works have been translated in Greece, France, Germany, Great Britain, Spain, Ireland, Argentina, Uruguay, Russia, USA.

Poetry (Selected)

 * Il sicario della Tiade, with drawings by Garouste, Barni, Monari, Bonechi, Galliani. Cleto Polcina, Rome, 1985.
 * Il tredicesimo mese/Il tempo abbandonato, with drawings by Tommaso Cascella. Ellequadro, Genova, 1990.
 * Il codice, Origini/La Scaletta, San Polo d'Enza, 1991 (it will be set to music by Fernando Mencherini; performance on double bass by Stefano Scodanibbio).
 * Il dolore, with drawings by Omar Galliani. All'Insegna del Pesce d'Oro/Scheiwiller, Milan, 1991.
 * Nell'abbraccio dell'io, with watercolors by Luigi Ontani. Enrico Astuni, Fano, 1998.
 * Il digiuno imposto, with works by Mimmo Paladino. Matthes & Seitz Verlag, Munich, 2000, and Emede, Buenos Aires, 2002.
 * Gli addii, Moretti & Vitali, Bergamo/Milano, 2003.
 * Resistere fino all’ultimo uomo, with works by Iller Incerti. Diabasis, Reggio Emilia, 2004.
 * Elogio alla diversità, with works by the author. Arte Com, Avellino, 2008.
 * Tutto il calore del mondo, with works by Mimmo Paladino. Skirà/Rizzoli, 2013.
 * Nel vortice delle acque superiori, with works by Omar Galliani. Raffaelli, 2015.

Fiction (Selected)

 * Caneserpente, Il Saggiatore, Milano, 1993.

Essays and other works (Selected)

 * Pesta duro e vai trànquilo. Dizionario del linguaggio giovanile (co-author Emilio Dalmonte). Feltrinelli, Milano, 1980.
 * Pelàsgi. I poeti romagnoli in lingua (con Davide Argnani). Maggioli, Rimini, 1986.
 * Peso vero sclero. Dizionario del linguaggio giovanile di fine millennio, Il Saggiatore, Milano, 1997.
 * Oltre il tempo, 11 poeti per una Metavanguardia'', Diabasis, Reggio Emilia, 2004.
 * Esodo (Book of Exodus, translation and editing). Raffaelli, Rimini, 2010.
 * Genesi (Book of Genesis, translation and editing). De Piante, Busto Arsizio, 2022.
 * Isaia (Book of Isaiah, translation and editing). De Piante, Busto Arsizio, 2024.

Collections

 * Scritture scelte Volume I e II, Edizioni del Bradipo, Lugo, 2006 (the book collects Manzoni's first work).