Valente Cancogni

ARTIST'S NOTE
“Wrestling with the impulse toward destruction, in pursuit of an ideal perfection that I find, however, so far removed from verisimilitude. Yet, each time, it seems just a little further away. Beyond reach, perhaps.”
— Valente Cancogni
THIS CONFESSION lays bare Cancogni's true hand-to-hand combat with sculpture. The artist battles the impulse to destroy the material — not in pursuit of an ideal of perfection, but to force the form to reveal what the mind cannot yet say. The horizon shifts, each time, a little further away: the sculpture we encounter in these pages is never a settled destination, but the sole survivor of a necessary struggle.

BA in Experimental Drawing, Sculpture Major, from the Accademia di Belle Arti di Carrara

CURRICULUM
Selected Exhibitions & Awards
Public Works and Permanent Installations
2025 Mai più (Never Again) — acquired for the art collection of the Regional Council of Tuscany, Palazzo del Pegaso, Florence.
2018 Girotondo (Round Dance) — permanent public installation, Piazza Garibaldi roundabout, Municipality of Massa.
Since 2009 Permanent display — Banca Versilia Lunigiana e Garfagnana – BCC Credito Cooperativo, Massa branch.
Selected Solo Exhibitions
2016 Parkour – Marble 2016, Showroom, Via Verdi 8-A, Carrara. Promoted by the Culture Department of the Municipality of Carrara.
2015 Solo exhibition, Showroom, Via S. Maria, Carrara. Held as part of Parkour – Marble 2015.
2006 Solo exhibition, Torre Capitolare, Portovenere.
2005 Solo exhibition, Orto degli Angeli, Biella.
Selected Group Exhibitions
2025
– The Bridge Gallery, Dubai, United Arab Emirates.
– Segni – International Exhibition, Palazzo Ducale, Massa (7–15 June).
2024
– Las Musas Encantadoras (The Enchanting Muses), Museo del Mar, Santa Pola, Alicante, Spain (13 July – 10 September).
– Chianciano Biennale, Chianciano Art Museum — selected work: Divenire (Becoming) (3–18 August).
– Not-Only Urban, AGARTE Fucina delle Arti, Frascati (21–30 June).
– Vigevano Bienn...