Jonathan Monk will be developing new films, an artist book and a series of ceramic sculptures. These will be presented alongside other existing works in an exhibition curated by Vittoria Bonifati at the Torre Bonomo during the Festival dei Due Mondi 2024.

Monk is a Berlin-based British artist whose work includes a wide range of media including installations, photography, film, sculpture and performance. His practice recalls the procedural strategies typical of Conceptual and Minimalist art of the 1960s and 1970s. These approaches are often grounded by a personal or playful twist. His work reflects on the tendency of contemporary art to devour references; he simultaneously pays homage to figures such as Sol LeWitt, Ed Ruscha, Bruce Nauman and Lawrence Weiner, whilst demystifying the creative process and suggesting alternative models for how art and the role of the artist can be interpreted.

In the early 2000s Monk started making a series of short animation films using artist’s books from his personal collection, often destroying them in the process, among which are books by Sol LeWitt. For his solo exhibition in the Torre Bonomo, he will present a selection of these works including the 16mm film A Cube Sol LeWitt photographed by Carol Huebner using nine different light sources and all their combinations front to back back to front forever (2001). The work references LeWitt’s 1990 book A Cube.

Vittoria Bonifati is a curator based in Rome. She runs Villa Lontana, an independent art space initiated in 2018 in collaboration with Jo Melvin. Her research explores the relationship between ancient and contemporary practices. In 2019 she launched the record label Villa Lontana Records, focused on the production of new sounds, from electroacoustic to sonorous poetry and field recordings. She curates 16MM RUN at the MACRO Museum in Rome featuring avant-garde and experimental films from the ’60s, ’70s, and ’80s in 16mm film. In 2022 she curated the ten-year-long exhibition The Colours of Antiquity at the Capitoline Museums, dedicated to polychrome marbles of the imperial age from the Santarelli Foundation.