Ludovico Pratesi

After Jannis Kounellis and Michelangelo Pistoletto, this year the Church of San Paolo a Cattaro hosts Montenegro Amaro-Sapore vero, the great banner hand painted on canvas by the Italian artist Flavio Favelli, inspired by the historical label of Amaro Montenegro and realized for the occasion.

The latter is made by a historic company in the hinterland of Bologna, founded by the nobleman Silvano Cobianchi in 1885, who in the early years devoted himself to liqueurs and then disappeared as rosolio, ratafia or old milk. After a trip to Montenegro Cobianchi decided to exploit his knowledge of aromatic herbs to give life to the house specialty, a liqueur that contains 40 different herbs, baptized Amaro Montenegro in honor of Elena Petrovich Niegos, princess of Montenegro and future queen of Italy alongside Vittorio Emanuele III, remembered by the emblem of his native country, present on the label. The success arrived immediately, so that Gabriele d'Annunzio baptized the bitter "the liquor of the virtues", which for 130 years offers a "true flavor".

"Intrigued by this story that links Italy to Montenegro through a queen and a liqueur, Favelli decided to interpret the label of the historic drink to turn it into a large canvas painted in black and white, which incorporates the graphics and motifs of original image, playing on the iconic value of the image, a guarantee of tradition and originality "explains the curator of the exhibition Ludovico Pratesi.

Falvio Favelli was born in Florence in 1967. He lives and works in Savigno (BO). He has exhibited in public and private spaces in Italy and abroad, such as museums: MACRO and MAXXI in Rome, MAMbo in Bologna, Museo Marino Marini in Florence, Palazzo Riso in Palermo, Center for Contemporary Art Luigi Pecci in Prato, Fondazione Sandretto Re Rebaudengo of Turin, Maison Rouge - Fondation Antoine de Galbert of Paris, Projectspace 176, London. The main group exhibitions include those held at the Peggy Guggenheim Collection in Venice, GAMeC in Bergamo, Castello di Rivoli and GAM in Turin, at the 11th Biennial of Havana, at the No Soul For Sale festival of the Tate Modern in London, at the Pomodoro Foundation in Milan, at the MADRE Museum and at the PAN in Naples, at the MOCA in Shanghai, at Villa delle Rose - GAM in Bologna, at the Museum of Modern Art in Saint-Étienne, at the Museion in Bolzano and at ppElgiz Museum of Contemporary Art | Elgiz Museum is in Istanbul. He participated in the XIII Sculpture Biennial in Carrara and the XV Quadriennale in Rome at the Palazzo delle Esposizioni as well as in the "Italics" exhibition at Palazzo Grassi, Venice, then touring at the MCA in Chicago.