Stefano Bombardieri | The Boy and The Elephant: ERARTA MUSEUM, Saint Petersburg

Oblong Contemporary is enthusiastic to announce the upcoming exhibition at the ERARTA Museum of Saint Petersburg "STEFANO BOMBARDIERI: THE BOY AND THE ELEPHANT".

Whales, rhinos, elephants, hippos populate the amazing creative universe of Stefano Bombardieri. A large playground where nothing is what it seems. With apparent lightness, pleasantly enchanted, his works lead us between reality and fiction. His sculptures disregard common sense to project, ironically, their opposite. Beyond the marvelous appearance there is always a reflection on daily life. The spectators are called to observe, be amazed, have fun, but also to think about subjects that are anything but playful. The animals, monumental and powerful, absolute protagonists of the exhibition, thus become witnesses of their imminent extinction. 

Stefano Bombardieri is an artist with a solid reputation. He has participated several times in the Venice Biennale and his works have been displayed in major art galleries in Italy and abroad. His works, in the balance between hyper-realism and surrealism  invite us to a certain philosophical reflection. He is fond of subjects that are based on the animal world such as: whales, rhinos, crocodiles and elephants which are suspended or trapped and crushed by mountains of luggage. The work of Bombardieri evokes the time and its perception, but also the pain and death.

Erarta is the largest private museum of contemporary art in Russia.

His collection includes over 2,800 works by Russian artists. The museum hosts over 40 temporary exhibitions annually. The Erarta Museum of Contemporary Art has been repeatedly included in the list of interesting sights of the world's largest travel guide Lonely Planet, according to the travel portal TripAdvisor it was included in the top ten museums in Russia, marked by National Geographic in the five must-see museums in St. Petersburg, and became the country's first museum contemporary art featured on the Google Arts and Culture Project.