Birolli Art Foundation

The Birolli Art Foundation was established on 17 February 2025 on the initiative of Viviana Birolli, art historian and granddaughter of the artist, and her husband Carlo Ettore Colombo.

The Foundation’s project builds upon the activities of the Associazione Renato Birolli, founded in 2014 by the artist’s son, Marco Birolli, and of the Renato Birolli Archive, which has documented the artist’s pictorial production and writings for more than fifty years. Conceived as a living archive, the Foundation seeks to restore to Birolli’s work its full historical and critical depth and significance within a resolutely international perspective. This ambition is pursued through major international exhibitions in Italy and, above all, through the development of exhibition and research projects abroad, as well as through collaborations with artists, creators and international institutions.

Presided over by Viviana Birolli, the Birolli Art Foundation works closely with Carlo Ettore Colombo, Vice-President and Secretary General, the distinguished Milanese collector Giuseppe Iannaccone, and a substantial body of experts brought together within the Foundation’s Scientific and Cultural Committee. In addition to Viviana Birolli, the Committee includes Luca Massimo Barbero, Elena Pontiggia, Paolo Rusconi, Sileno Salvagnini, Francesco Tedeschi, Ernesto Damiani and Nico Stringa, all recognised specialists in the art of the first half of the twentieth century, active both in academic and scholarly research and in the study, promotion and historical and critical reassessment of Italy’s twentieth-century cultural heritage.

Among the principal missions of the Archive and the Foundation are the issuance of certificates of authenticity, and the reconstruction, documentation and enhancement of the critical history, exhibition history, provenance and acquisition history of the artist’s works. This scholarly activity is intended, in particular, to support the development of exhibition and publishing projects, as well as the preparation of a new general catalogue of the artist’s oeuvre, updated and expanded in relation to the edition published by Feltrinelli in 1978.

Based in Milan, the Archive and the Foundation do not currently operate public exhibition spaces, but may be visited by appointment.