Wangechi Mutu at the Galleria Borghese: Art, Myth, and Metamorphosis in the Roman Night
Last Monday, the Galleria Borghese hosted an exclusive evening to inaugurate “Black Soil Poems”, the first solo exhibition in Rome by Kenyan-American artist Wangechi Mutu—a visionary with a fluid and powerful voice. A site-specific intervention curated by Cloé Perrone, the show has gently, almost subversively, infiltrated the rooms of Cardinal Scipione’s residence, the façade, and the Secret Gardens, planting a mix of hybrid presences, organic materials, and distant mythologies into one of the most emotionally charged spaces of Western art (and beyond).
Amidst sculptures by Bernini and Canova, the works—including “Suspended Playtime”, “Ndege”, “First”, and “The Seated I and IV” —defy gravity: they hang, float, and rest, offering new visual and sensory horizons. A delicate balance between sound and silence guides the experience. In the frescoed halls, bronze—an ancient, authoritative material—intertwines with feathers, paper, water, and wax to create creatures that seem to emerge from a dreamscape, from the earth itself. These are voices rising from a buried yet unforgotten past. The “black earth” of the title is fertile: a metaphor for the generative force of this major artist, long based in the U.S.
Among the first to arrive at the opening were familiar faces from the worlds of art, film, fashion, and culture, all immersed in a poetic, almost magical journey. Say Who’s lens captured not only the artist herself, but also Silvia Venturini Fendi, Cloé Perrone, Vittoria Puccini, Silvio Orlando, Delfina Delettrez Fendi, Richard Saltoun, Francesca Cappelletti, Pietro Ruffo, and Taabu Munyoki.
From the gardens to the façade, from the video “The End of Eating Everything” to the sculpture “Shavasana I”—on view at the American Academy in Rome—the exhibition moves between tension and spirituality, questioning the museum as a living, ever-evolving space. With the support of FENDI, Galleria Borghese continues to rewrite its identity, embracing an art that doesn’t just adorn the space, but inhabits and transforms it.
Photos: Niccolò Campita
Text: Germano D’Acquisto
