Valentina Moncada
Valentina Moncada di Paternò is an Italian art historian, gallery owner, and curator who specializes in contemporary art. In 1990 she opened an art gallery in Rome in Via Margutta 54, establishing herself as a talent scout due to a program of young international artists who soon became known worldwide.
Biography
Valentina Moncada is the daughter of fashion photographer Johnny Moncada and model Joan Whelan. In 1976 she left Rome at 17 years of age to study art history in New York where she obtained a B.A. at Sarah Lawrence College and an M.A. from New York University, Institute of Fine Arts. She was awarded the Hilla Von Rebay Fellowship at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum where she worked in the curatorial department. She then worked at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in the Community Education Department and became a Teacher Assistant to Professor Kenneth Silver at New York University. A work experience with New York-based, Italian gallery owner Annina Nosei marked a turning point in Moncada's career as she became acquainted with some of the leading personalities of the SoHo art scene of the 1980s, including Leo Castelli, Ileana Sonnabend and Jean-Michel Basquiat.Curatorial Projects
Outside of her gallery space, Moncada has curated many international exhibitions, including Theo by Richard Avedon at Musei Capitolini, Académie de France à Rome, Villa Medici Rome; Carlo Gavazzeni Ricordi Theater of Invention in Rome at The State Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg, at MUAR - Shchusev State Museum of Architecture and Sotheby's Moscow ; Via Margutta Art Festival, Rome ;. In 2014 she co-curated with Antonio Monfreda the exhibition From Vera to Veruschka: The Unseen Photographs by Johnny Moncada at Somerset House, London, and then at MACRO - Museum of Contemporary Art of Rome; In 2014 she curated the exhibition Made in Italy: Una Visione Modernista. Johnny Moncada Gastone Novelli Achille Perilli with the collaboration of Ludovico Pratesi, at Museo Nazionale Etrusco di Villa Giulia, Rome. In 2017 she joined the scientific committee of the exhibition Picasso. Between Cubism and Classicism 1915 – 1925 curated by Olivier Berggruen with Princess Maria-Anunciata of Liechtenstein at the Scuderie del Quirinale, Rome.Moncada is also the author of several publications, including :
- "The Painters Guild in the City of Venice and Padua", Harvard University Press, 1988
- "Marcel Duchamp. 11 Rue Larry 1927", L'Attico Editore, 1988, with a joint text by Robert Rosenblum
- "Picasso a Roma ", Electa, Rome, 2007
- “Atelier a via Margutta. Cinque secoli di cultura internazionale a Roma”, Umberto Allemandi & Co., Turin, 2012
- Made in Italy. Una visione modernista. Johnny Moncada Gastone Novelli Achille Perilli. Fotografia - Moda - Arte - Design. Roma, 1956 - 1965, Silvana Editoriale, 2014
- Joan. Paris Haute Couture – Italia Alta Moda 1952 – 1967, Silvana Editoriale, 2015.