1999 – 2014: CASTELLO DI AMA CELEBRATES THE FIRST 15 YEARS OF THE CASTELLO DI AMA PER L ’ARTE CONTEMPORANEA (CASTELLO DI AMA FOR CONTEMPORARY

ART) PROJECT WITH A NEW INSTALLATION BY JAPANESE ARTIST HIROSHI SUGIMOTO

Marco Pallanti and Hiroshi Sugimoto Cas tel lo di Ama, Gaiole in Chianti (S I) – Wine and Art, sensibility and beauty. Modern culture rooted in tradition and the local land. Since 1999, the Cas tel lo di Ama for Contemporary Art project, in collaboration with the Ga l ler ia Continua in San Gimignano / Beijing / Les Moulins, has invited the most inspirational contemporary artists to create site-specific works of art for the little hamlet in the heart of Chianti. To celebrate the first 15 years of this important artistic and cultural project, which has brought such high-caliber personalities as Michelangelo Pistoletto, Louise Bourgeois, and Anish Kapoor to Ama, Marco Pallanti and Lorenza Sebasti, passionate collectors and owners of the Castel lo di Ama winery, have undertaken an important collaboration with Hiroshi Sugimoto, who is among the most influential Japanese artists. Marco Pallanti, the artistic director of the Caste l lo di Ama for Contemporary Ar t project, explains his affinity for Maestro Sugimoto in this way: “When I first met Hiroshi in his studio in Tokyo toward the end of 2012, it was the beginning of a dream for me. I always loved Japanese culture, style, and refined elegance, and for me, his works represent their most profound essence, especially the more recent ones, which are centered on complex mathematical studies that tend to give form to the invisible, which, as Antoine de Saint-Exupery wrote, is invisible to the eyes, but not to the heart.” On Saturday , Ocotber 18th, the Caste l lo d i Ama for Contemporary Ar t project’s newest installation, the result of the collaboration with Hiroshi Sugimoto, will be unveiled. Sugimoto has created a fascinating work entitled Confess ion of Zero, inspired by the number zero. Carried out in collaboration with the Ga l ler ia Continua, one of the principle international organizations dedicated to contemporary art, Confess ion of Zero celebrates the concept of “zero,” the number that contains everything.

Hiroshi Sugimoto says: “Everything that exists originates from zero and returns to it. Zero does not exist in the physical world; it is nothing more than a vague and uncertain memory buried in our conciousness, because in it, consciousness itself originates.” The site-specific work of art, located in the 18th-century chapel of Villa Ricucci, is the representation of two cone-shaped mathematical models made out of marble and stainless steel with the upper part suspended. Hiroshi Sugimoto invites us to carefully observe the almost invisible point that separates them: in it, the mystery of existence is hidden. From 1999 until today, the artists that have left their personal mark on Ama are: Michelangelo Pistoletto, Daniel Buren, Giulio Paolini, Kendell Geers, Anish Kapoor, Chen Zhen, Carlos Garaicoa, Nedko Solakov, Cristina Iglesias, Louise Bourgeois, Ilya and Emilia Kabakov, Pascale Marthine Tayou, Hiroshi Sugimoto. www.castellodiama.com www.galleriacontinua.com B iography of Hirosh i Sug imoto Hiroshi Sugimoto was born in Tokyo in 1948. After receiving a degree in economics, he moved to the United States in 1970 to study photography at the Art Center College of Design in Los Angeles. He has been in New York since 1974, and in addition to his work as a photographer, he is also an antiques collector. As a multidisciplinary artist, Sugimoto explores such themes as time, empiricism, metaphysics, and mathematics from a point of view that unites East and West. His most important works include the photographic series Dioramas, Theaters, Seascapes, Architectures, Portraits, Conceptual Forms, and Lighting Fields. Sugimoto’s works of art are present in the collections of the most prestigious museums in the world, including the Tate Gallery in London, the Chicago Museum of Contemporary Art, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. His series of potraits originally created for the Deutsche Guggenheim Berlin was also exhibited at the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao in 2000 and at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York in March of 2001. In 2014, the Palais de Tokyo in Paris dedicated the monographic Aujourd’hui, le monde est mort to him. Hiroshi sugimoto has received numerous awards, including the Mainichi Art Prize in 1988, the Hasselblad Foundation’s International Award for Photography in 2001, and the Photo España Prize in 2006. In 2013, he was nominated as an Officier dans l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres by the French government. About Cas te l lo di Ama Ama is a small hamlet nestled in the Chianti hills: it is located in the town of Gaiole in Chianti in the provice of Siena among vineyards, olive groves, and woods. The Castello di Ama winery is renowned internationally as one of the world’s best, as well as the site of one of the most important contemporary collections of site-specific works of art. The winery, established in 1972 as the result of the passion of four Roman families, has a total surface area of nearly 230 hectares, of which 80 are dedicated to vineyard cultivation and 40 to olive trees, at an average altitude of 480 meters. The winery’s production of approximately 300 thousand bottles a year comes exclusively from their own vineyards and finds its arechetypal expression in “Castello di Ama,” an authentic ambassador of Chianti Classico.

INFORMATION FOR THE GENERAL PUBLIC

Castello di Ama’s private collection is open to the public by appointment.

For reservations:

T. 0039 0577 746031

E. info@castellodiama.com

www.castellodiama.com

Castello di Ama – Località Ama 53013 Gaiole in Chianti (SI)

Press Office:

Grassi + Partners PR Milano – Firenze - London

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