Francesco Stocchi Appointed Artistic Director of MAXXI

Rome’s Museo Nazionale delle Arti del XXI (MAXXI) has announced curator and author Francesco Stocchi as the institution’s artistic director. Stocchi succeeds Hou Hanru, who had led the institution since2013. The change comes amid a time of upheaval for the contemporary art and architecture institution, whose overseeing entity, the Fondazione MAXXI, a body established by the Italian ministry of cultural heritage, recently welcomed a new president, Alessandro Giuli. A major focus of Stocchi’s new role will be taking charge of exhibition programming, which is likely to change profoundly. Curator Francesco Bonami, in a June 27 article in Italian dailyIl foglio, decried MAXXI as “more of an art Airbnb than a real museum,” and contended that Stocchi would have to resist local influencers, noting that the reputation of a “serious” institution is built on “more knowing how to say no than yes.”RelatedHELEN FRANKENTHALER FOUNDATION SUED FOR “DESTROYING” PAINTER’S LEGACYBMA CREATES PAID INTERNSHIPS HONORING VALERIE MAYNARD Born in Rome in 1975, Stocchi has long been active in the contemporary art scene, both as a curator and as a writer. Most recently, he curated “Giuseppe Penone: Gestures,” currentlyon viewat Rome’s Galleria Borghese; anexhibitionof Argentinian installation artist Leandro Erlich at Milan’s Palazzo Reale; and Moroccan artist Latifa Echkach’sexhibitionat the Swiss pavilion at the Fifty-Ninth Venice Biennale.

In2011, he was named curator of modern and contemporary art Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen in Rotterdam. Concurrently, he curated the program at Fondazione Carriero in Milan. Stocchi additionally worked as a writer for various publications includingArtforum, to which he was a regular contributor. In 2010, he founded the magazineAGMA. His essays have appeared in catalogues and monographs on artists including Dan Colen, Gelatin, Arcangelo Sassolino, and Cindy Sherman. Stocchi additionally published a series of visual monographs.

Founded in 2010, MAXXI houses a collection of more than four hundred works, including those by Stefano Ariente, Francis Alys, Gabriele Basilico, Vanessa Beecroft, Manfredi Beninanti, Alighiero Boetti, Maurizio Cattelan, Gino de Dominicis, Marlene Dumas, Lara Favaretto, Luigi Ghirri, Gilbert & George, Francesco Gostoli, Anih Kapoor, William Kentridge, Michael Raedecker, Gerhard Richter, Ugo Rondinone, Thomas Ruff,  Ed Ruscha, Thomas Schutte, Kiki Smith, and Grazia Toderi. As well, it is home to the archives of architects Pier Luigi Nervi, Aldo Rossi, and Carlo Scarpa..