Exhibition | Rags by Darren Almond

Museo Cappella Sansevero is pleased to announce the opening of the exhibition Rags by British artist Darren Almond, produced in collaboration with the Alfonso Artiaco Gallery.
The exhibition, set up inside the Cappella Sansevero, will be open to the public from Wednesday, January 22, to Monday, March 17. Entry is included with the museum admission ticket. Access is subject to mandatory reservation.
Simultaneously, Almond will also be featured in Songbirds and Willows, hosted at the Alfonso Artiaco Gallery, just a few steps from the Cappella Sansevero in Piazzetta Nilo.
This double exhibition creates a path through the heart of Naples' historic center, offering visitors the chance to discover Darren Almond's latest works across various artistic mediums.

The English artist returns to Naples and, for the first time, exhibits six large-scale works in the Baroque masterpiece that houses the Veiled Christ.

The works on display in the nave of the Sansevero Chapel originate from photographs taken by the artist in a unique and secret location: the London studio of the late painter Lucian Freud, who passed away in 2011.

"[…] in Lucian’s studio I found myself staring into the folds and forms of his last, paint-stained cotton rags, details of which I photographed, then expanded and enlarged, resulting in these vast landscapes of the mind. […] But this was not enough; I felt there needed to be an awakening, in the way the veil of Sanmartino’s sculpture activates internal narratives […] I too applied a shroud of sorts, a veiling of paint and colour across these canvases of cotton rags […]"

This is how Darren Almond describes the creative process that led to Rags. The artist draws inspiration from the paint-stained rags, a constant material presence in a painter’s daily practice and, at the same time, a tangible record of the creative act, bearing the imprints of experiments and remnants of what would ultimately come to life on the painted canvas.

The ‘Rags’, which give the Naples exhibition its name – are streaked with traces of paint, sometimes vivid, sometimes softened by the blending of various colours and repeated use. The now dry paint lends the fabric both a certain rigidity and a sculptural quality. Darren Almond photographs them up close, seeking to capture their almost sculpturelike appearance, and produces large-scale works, transforming them into a textured landscape in which viewers can immerse themselves. The subsequent application of paint allows Almond to become part of that creative process, suspended and frozen at its inception.

The result immediately calls to mind the folds and creases of the rich, vividly coloured drapery in the Cappella Sansevero, animating the lively perspectival vault and the marble representations of cloth that appear to spill from the cornice of the Deposition over the High Altar. It also succeeds in evoking the delicate gossamer veils, with their ethereal lightness and almost wet effect which envelop the bodies of the Veiled Christ and Modesty.

The conceptual space the artist creates inside the nave obliges visitors to engage with the material before directing their gaze immediately towards the sculptures in an interplay of references that brings out their forms and harmonies.

Darren Almond was born in Appley Bridge, United Kingdom, in 1971 and graduated with a BA in Fine Arts from the Winchester School of Art.
His research focuses on themes of time, duration, and the relationships between individuals and their surroundings; his work often adopts an enigmatic visual language, transforming deeply personal and family-related experiences into reflections on universal aspects of human life. These themes are further enriched by his encounters with local cultures during his extensive travels to remote corners of all seven continents.
A recurring element in Almond’s work is his attempt to understand the relentless passage of time, a concept he explores across various media, particularly sculpture, painting, video, and photography. Other recurring motifs are clocks and especially numbers, such as the often-present zero, described as “the void that binds all things together”.
This exploration is reflected in his Fullmoon series. He has been travelling the world, exploring untouched landscapes and documenting lunar cycles since 2000. Using long-exposure techniques, he captures these scenes in the moonlight, the only source of illumination. Almond’s images evoke contemplative moods and dreamlike landscapes, echoing the spirit of the Romantic tradition and figures such as John Constable, William Turner, and Caspar David Friedrich. Shadows disappear, clouds become two-dimensional, and bodies of still water are bathed in an almost spectral light.
In all his works, Almond favours large formats, which allow viewers to immerse themselves in the creative space.
Several of Almond’s works feature in the permanent collections of institutions such as MoMA in New York, the Tate Gallery in London, and the Art Institute of Chicago. He has held solo exhibitions at Jesus College, Cambridge, UK (2019), the New Art Centre in Salisbury, UK (2016), and Scai the Bathhouse in Tokyo (2016). He has also contributed to numerous group exhibitions, including at the Getty Center in Los Angeles (2021), the Fondation Van Gogh in Arles (2020), and the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York (2019).

The Rags exhibition will be included with the purchase of the museum entrance ticket. Advance booking required.

Museo Cappella Sansevero
RAGS
by Darren Almond
January 22 to March 17, 2025
Naples, Via Francesco De Sanctis 19/21
For information and opening hours, visit museosansevero.it.