Colnaghi is excited to announce a joint exhibition with Carlo Bella, Power Figures, opening on the 27th of May and running until the 6th of June. The presentation will feature museum-quality historical African and Native American artworks alongside Old Master Paintings and works from Greco-Roman Antiquity.
Taking its title from the term ‘Power Figure,’ used in African Art to denote ancestral statues and reliquaries that served as instruments for protecting, healing and administering justice in tribal communities, this exhibition aims to investigate artworks as sites of memory, legacy, and convention, and to create dialogues between artistic traditions that speak to the significance of human representation in the formation and maintenance of cultural tradition.
Carlo Bella will present twenty important pieces of African and Native American Art. A highlight of the showcase is a large fetish figure from the Songye Culture, formerly in the collection of New York art dealer Allan Stone.
Colnaghi will present a selection of European portrait paintings, as well as Classical Antiquities. Showing in America for the first time in history, the imposing full-length, life-sized Portrait of a Noblewoman by the most important of the Neapolitan Caravaggisti, Giovanni Battista Caracciolo (Naples 1578 – 1635 Naples), will be a highlight of the showcase. The Portrait of a Noblewoman is at present the only attributed full-length portrait by Caracciolo.
Power Figures will be on view at Colnaghi New York, 23 East 67th Street, 4th Floor, New York, NY 10065, from the 27th of May to the 6th of June 2025; previews will be available by appointment starting on the 20th of May.