IN GIOCO. Art and Play from the Risorgimento to the Present Day

Play is a serious matter, an invisible thread running through the history of’Italy and which is rarely covered in traditional textbooks. This extraordinary exhibition, curated by Ermanno Tedeschi, offers a unique interdisciplinary programme, capable of restoring to the toy the status of a genuine historical document. Inside the halls of the National Museum of the Italian Risorgimento, located in 8 Piazza Carlo Alberto a Turin, visitors can immerse themselves in a fascinating interplay that links rare games from the 19th century, Lenci dolls accompanied by sketches by Mario Sturani e Marcello Dudovich, pop-up books, puppets, artefacts from criminal anthropology and splendid works by contemporary artists.

The exhibition route winds its way through five sections themes that go beyond a rigid chronological framework to focus on the social and cultural functions of play. We’ll start with The game that teaches, where toys and interactive books helped to shape the identity of the newly unified nation , before moving on to the Focus on Pinocchio. Here is the famous puppet from Collodi (also known as a patriot in the Wars of Independence) becomes the archetype of childhood, brought to life by the powerful iron puppet of Orna Ben-Ami.

The most moving section, The game to ensure we don’t forget, features hand-made cards produced by prisoners studied by Cesare Lombroso, objects created in the psychiatric hospitals in Turin and artefacts belonging to the disabled from the Great War: a testimony to play as an act of survival and dignity. Finally, The game of growing up explores the transmission of social roles, including a delicate little bronze statue of Leonardo Bistolfi and an in-depth look at the disability , while The Game of Art showcases the creativity of masters such as Alessandro Mendini, Ezio Gribaudo, Daniele Basso, Liliana Porter e Nicola Bolla.