Fashion as an Italian Emblem: Models and Discourses of Germano Celant's Exhibitions on Italy from 1981 to 1994

From the beginning of the 1980s, Germano Celant curated a series of exhibitions on Italian art and culture, aimed at enhancing Arte povera no longer as an international trend but as an Italian heritage. Together with design but also with cinema, architecture and other creative and productive sectors, fashion played (or should have played, for curator’s purposes) a strategic role that this contribution aims to illustrate. The juxtaposition of works of art with objects of a different nature responded to a previous cultural and curatorial model, which Celant adapted for his very specific purposes. The significant new expansion of the Italian fashion and design industry in the 1980s helped generate interest in Italian creativity, including contemporary art and exhibitions. If on the one hand, this led to a virtuous circle of mutual support, on the other it also inevitably ended up leading to some shifts in meaning.