Serpentine to present Thoughts in the Roots, the most comprehensive institutional exhibition of Giuseppe Penone presented in the UK ever. The exhibition will be staged at Serpentine South and extend beyond the gallery to feature sculptures in the Royal Parks.
Thoughts in the Roots showcases the artist’s continued interest in the relationship between humans and the natural world, featuring works that range from 1969 to today. A leading figure in the Arte Povera movement, born in Italy in the 1960s,that celebrates the simplicity of natural materials and artistic techniques, Giuseppe Penone experiments with a wide range of materials including wood, iron, wax, bronze,terracotta, marble and plaster, bringing their individual physical qualities to the fore.
Since its launch in the 1970s, Serpentine has maintained a long-standing commitment to bringing art out of the traditional gallery context and into the surrounding landscape, offering an opportunity for artists to engage with the immediate environment of Kensington Gardens.
“To breathe the perfume of the leaves that cover the walls of the environment, to inhale the fragrance of the resin extracted from the trees and poured into an empty tree trunk, these are actions that allow us to perceive the space of Serpentine as a continuum with the nature of the park that surrounds it.”
“All of my work is a trial to express my adherence and belonging to nature, and it is with this thought that I have chosen the works for the exhibition. The two paths that I have created, inside the gallery and outside of it, in the park, become two integrated gardens.”
Giuseppe Penone
Bettina Korek, CEO, Serpentine, and Hans Ulrich Obrist, Artistic Director, Serpentine, say:
“We are honoured to present Giuseppe Penone’s exhibition at Serpentine South. Thoughts in the Roots will celebrate his impressive five-decade practice and uncover the visual, tactile, and olfactory dimensions of the materials he explores. Revealing the fragile and poetic relationships between humans and nature, the exhibition will exemplify Penone’s experimental research and feature new works presented in the UK for the first time and extends into The Royal Parks. Following his participation in the Garden Marathon – our knowledge festive – at Serpentine in 2011 and his contribution to 140 Artists’ Ideas for Planet Earth, we’re thrilled that this leading figure of the Arte Povera movement, has accepted our invitation to bring the Park into the gallery and vice versa. Responding to the Spring and Summer seasons, Penone’s delicate landscape will nurture Serpentine’s mission of building new connections between artists and audiences.”
The exhibition will embody the key principles of Penone’s work, namely the synergies between artistic and natural process, and the poetic relationship between humans and nature. Since the 1970s, Penone has visualised breath as sculpture through different materials.
Highlights will include Respirare l’ombra (To Breathe the Shadow), a sensory installation made of laurel leaves that envelops the walls of the gallery. The artist compares the process of breathing to that of lost wax castings, in which metal flows into the mould and air is expelled from reeds, similar to lungs respiring. Reminding us of the fleeting nature of organic elements, the artwork is conceived as an immersive experience celebrating respiration and dissipating over time as the leaves lose their scent and colour. Exploring the rapport between nature and body, Penone also uses organic materials to record his own breath. In Soffio di foglie (Breath of Leaves), the artist stacks boxwood leaves and lies down on the pile, breathing air into them. The imprint of his body and respiration is cast on the leaves, recording traces of his bodily presence.
The exhibition opens with A occhi chiusi (With Eyes Closed), a work showcasing the artist’s combined interest in exploring the relationship between sight and the act of closing one’s eyes. His first exploration started in 1970 with Rovesciare i propri occhi (Reversing One’s Eyes), a black and white photograph that captured Penone looking directly at the viewer while wearing reflective contactlenses that rendered him blind. With the absence of vision, he creates a space for imagination within the mind. The numerous acacia thorns on canvas echo a synthesis of our senses in connection with nature too.
The vegetal world is a central subject in Penone’s work, citing the tree as the ‘primal and most simple idea of vitality, of culture, of sculpture’. He created his first Alberi (Trees) in 1969, by removing the wood along the outer growth rings of mature timber layer-by-layer. Knots were left in place as they emerged into branches, revealing how the tree would have appeared before it was felled.
The exhibition features Alberi libro (Book Trees), a sculpture consisting of twelve carved saplings placed side by side. ‘Every word for tree collects days of rain, sun mist, contains seasons, memories of places, oftimes experienced, that have a different meaning from person to person. They are words that fill the woods with their presence, invade the landscape, force us to an interpretation of motion, active, and push us for their correct interpretation in the forest’s care.’
Gesti vegetali (Vegetal Gestures) is a series of sculptures that encapsulates the gestures of plants and the movement of the body. Penone created the first drawings of Gesti vegetali in the 1980s, outlining the movement of the human body. He molded the work in clay before casting it in bronze, a material which the artist began utilising after realising the oxidation resembled the same colour as the bark of trees. Each sculpture is placed in a plant pot and positioned outside the gallery windows, in dialogue with the trees in Kensington Gardens.
Designed by Atelier Dyakova, an artist book will be published to accompany the exhibition. Featuring drawings and new writings from Penone alongside the contributions from Ludovico Einaudi and other contextualising texts. The publication will also feature an extended interview between Penone and Hans Ulrich Obrist discussing the artist’s inspiration and practice.
Penone has a longstanding relationship with Serpentine. He previously worked with Ecologies at Serpentine, which encompasses myriad convenings, networks, infrastructural and long-term research projects which hold ecology and the environment attheir core. The artist was a participant in the 2011 Garden Marathon at Serpentine. This two-day event was an exploration of the concept of the garden. He is also featured in the book 140 Artists’ Ideas for Planet Earth, published by Serpentine and Penguin.
Thoughts in the Roots is curated by Claude Adjil, Curator at Large; and Hans Ulrich Obrist, Artist Director with Alexa Chow, Assistant Exhibitions Curator.
The exhibition will be accompanied by a special limited edition. This will be a limited edition print and will be released on the week of the opening of the exhibition. For more information on the available editions, contact editions@serpentinegalleries.org.
Giuseppe Penone Thoughts in the Roots, 3rd April – 7th September 2025 Serpentine South
About the artist
With a career spanning over five decades, Giuseppe Penone’s (b. 1947 lives and works in Turin, Italy) expansive oeuvre encompasses sculptures, drawings, painting, installations, and photography. Born in Garessio, a village near Cuneo, Italy, he is influenced by the forested region of Northern Italy.
He has been featured in solo exhibitions worldwide including at the Fondazione Ferrero, Alba (2024); at the Galleria Borghese, Rome (2023); Centre Pompidou, Paris (2004, 2022); Philadelphia Museum of Art (2022); Villa Medici, Rome (2021); Palais d’léna – CESE, Paris, (2019); Yorkshire Sculpture Park, Wakefield (2018); Chateau La Coste, Le Puy-Sainte-Réparade (2017); Palazzo della Civiltà, Rome (2017); Louvre Abu Dhabi (2017); MART, Rovereto (2016); Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam (2016); Nasher Sculpture Center, Dallas (2015); Musée Cantonal des Beaux-Arts, Lausanne (2015); the Beirut Art Center (2014); the Musée de Grenoble (2014); the Château de Versailles (2013); Kunstmuseum Winterthur (2013); Madison Square Park, New York (2013) and Whitechapel Gallery, London (2013). Giuseppe Penone
has exhibited at Documenta V (1972), VII (1982), VIII (1987) and XIII (2012) and at the Venice
Biennale in 1978, 1980, 1986, 1995 and 2007.
