Awareness, together with the need to reawaken in sculpture the possibility of undertaking new forms and modes of expression – escaping conventional linguistic frameworks – has led Valentina Palazzari (Terni, 1975) to conceive Fiammetta, an exhibition project curated by Davide Sarchioni and hosted in Palazzo Pretorio in Certaldo until 26 January 2026. On this occasion, the six rooms, former seats of the Florentine Vicars since the fifteenth century, not only serve as a stimulus in relation to the historical figure and Boccaccian muse Fiammetta but also suggests a reinterpretation of social structures, cultural imprints and even the economic and political implications of the site. However, Palazzari does not limit herself to a simple re-examination; rather, she conceives environmental installations through associations of heterogeneous materials, adopting a critical stance toward the place, its history, and the perceptual processes involved in reading the spaces themselves.
Valentina Palazzari, “Fiammetta”, exhibition view, Palazzo Pretorio, Certaldo, 2025, courtesy of the artist, ph. credit Giorgio Benni
A common element in all the works is their pragmatism and tautological nature, as – detached from any form of idealization – what is conceived gathers and enhances the most physical and tangible aspects of the materials used. From this emerges a question concerning the nature of sculpture, because for Palazzari, as already mentioned, the installed works are not considered as objects occupying space nor as figures, but rather as forms to be shaped by following precise impulses and trajectories, to investigate the voids and solids of space. For this reason, each work is first and foremost a form with its own autonomous physics, called upon to present rather than represent. Working with elements that are at once extremely simple and concrete – such as plastic cable ties, jute, iron tubing, electrical cables, old and worn metal sheets – the artist allows the plasticity, expressive flexibility and formal quality of the materials to emerge naturally. Yet the process is never a mere conceptual reduction toward the essential; instead, it presents itself as an open and complex investigation in which natural and industrially derived components give rise to a slow, meditative, almost ascetic relationship with physicality.
Valentina Palazzari, “Fiammetta”, exhibition view, Palazzo Pretorio, Certaldo, 2025, courtesy of the artist, ph. credit Giorgio Benni
By analyzing the works, one can imagine the artist’s manual labor shaping their constituent elements: fingers tighten, roll, interlock and let liquids fall – actions that produce an economy of gesture, understood as a minimal, essential, and loosely controlled intervention, a movement with an uninhibited effect. Even where manual intervention is reduced to an essential assembly – such as in the chairs precariously balanced on stacks of books, the polyethylene bags and the banknotes mounted on iron tubing – a truth stronger than reality itself emerges, where a synthetic and realistic character confronts the raw reality of things. Nevertheless, from the style of the project a strong narrative dimension emerges, connected to the fourteenth and fifteenth century frescoes in the rooms of the Palazzo Pretorio, together with the cultural figure of Boccaccio, a native of Certaldo. Strengthened by these relationships with the historical site that hosts them, the works remain free of gratuitous aestheticization, so that their becoming may serve as a contemporary testimony – always functional to enlivening the past and never an end. At this point, it is significant to note how Palazzari does not wish to lead us toward a univocal reading of this narrative. Even if what is exhibited seems to suggest precise references, symbols and metaphors, interpretation remains free, unbound by any rigid ideology.
Valentina Palazzari, “Fiammetta”, exhibition view, Palazzo Pretorio, Certaldo, 2025, courtesy of the artist, ph. credit Giorgio Benni
The artist openly claims this, stating that to understand the project it is necessary to “add +1 to every thought”. Thanks to this rare freedom and interpretive richness, the invitation is to attribute greater weight, importance and depth to what is observed: each installation is not a symbol, but rather the trace of a form of spontaneous reflection. Although every gesture upon the material technically takes place as an act of closure and fixing – tightening plastic ties, wrapping a roll of paper onto itself, trapping a sheet between the floor and a block of travertine, closing book volumes within the joints of chairs – everything invites one to imagine a serene opening. In this way, we can retrace actions dear to any writer, likely also performed by Boccaccio himself: the harmonious flow of words across paper rolls, the need to physically fix a thought derived from a book, recognizing the cultural value of every page.
Valentina Palazzari, “Fiammetta”, exhibition view, Palazzo Pretorio, Certaldo, 2025, courtesy of the artist, ph. credit Giorgio Benni
Moreover, the reiteration of matter according to new expressive modes is part of Palazzari’s research dynamic, whereby in the repetition of certain elements it is natural and consequential for their form to vary, assuming increasingly diverse features. Compared to the previous exhibition held at Fondazione VOLUME! in 2023, this time in Certaldo, although the history of the site might seem not to allow it, given the historical value of the spaces, the artist appears more incisive in her relationship with the materials she works with. Fascination with matter, in its immersive dimension of form and color, is the first step in the design process: iron tubing, extended and compact volumes, heavy blocks of travertine initiate a kind of courtship with raw materials, an intuitive and meditative dialogue that leads back to the final form. Thus, the chosen materials also reflect the artist’s temperament, introspective, reflective, measured, in constant balance between luminous meditation and emotional turbulence. This can also be traced in the chairs balanced on books, in the jute canvases stably poised on wooden frames and in the radical poverty of rust, understood as a transient and reactive chemical compound originating from the alteration of iron.
Valentina Palazzari, “Fiammetta”, exhibition view, Palazzo Pretorio, Certaldo, 2025, courtesy of the artist, ph. credit Giorgio Benni
Precisely because of this constant visual and technical instability, Palazzari invites us to discover the dimensional possibilities of installations as experiences rather than mere formal solutions. At this point, one must ask how important the relationship is between physical tension and the poetry of materials, and whether this interdependence is perceptible in both the essential nature and the richness of these relationships. Nonetheless, for Palazzari the dimension of a work lies in the measure of the senses; for this reason, she focuses both on forms in space and on the energy that generated them, as well as the physical residues they produce. Yet for all this, there is no explanation other than Palazzari’s disarming awareness of translating that energy into something tangible through an equation – not so much mathematical, since it does not presuppose a strong aleatory component – summarized in the iconic formula “adding +1 to every thought”, the result of which is the happy and decisive contribution of displacing space elsewhere and fixing it concretely in form.
Info:
Valentina Palazzari. Fiammetta
curated by Davide Sarchioni
27/09/025 – 26/05/2026
Monday to Friday: 10:00–13:00 and 14:30–16:30
Saturday and Sunday: 10:00–13:00 and 14:30–17:30
Closed on Tuesdays
Piazzetta del Vicariato, 4, 50052 Certaldo, Firenze
www.visitcertaldo.com
Maria Vittoria Pinotti (1986, San Benedetto del Tronto) is an art historian, author, and independent critic. She currently is the coordinator of Claudio Abate’s photographic archive and Manager at Elena Bellantoni’s Studio. From 2016 to 2023 she was the Gallery Manager in a gallery in the historic center of Rome. She has worked with ministerial offices such as the General Secretariat of the Ministry of Culture and the Central State Archive. Currently, she collaborates with cultural sector magazines, focusing on in-depth thematic studies dedicated to modern and contemporary art.
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