Francesco Stocchi is the new director of Maxxi

Francesco Stocchi, born in 1975, is the new Artistic Director of Maxxi: he will take office on 1 September. Stocchi leaves the position of Curator for modern and contemporary art at the Boijmans Van Beuningen Museum in Rotterdam, which he held for 12 years. And it is precisely from the Dutch Museum that thanks and congratulations come for the new role conferred on him by Alessandro Giuli, president of the Maxxi Foundation, having acquired the favorable opinion of the Board of Directors. The selection was carried out on an international level by call on curricula and was entrusted to one of the major groups specialized in the search and selection of high-profile professionals which, at the end of its search, identified a final shortlist of eight candidates from the most important cultural institutions in Italy and abroad.

Francesco Stocchi was chosen for his rich experience in heterogeneous projects with an international scope. He will have the task of designing the cultural offer of the National Museum of XXI Century Arts, a point of reference for contemporary creativity in Italy and in the world. Francesco Stocchi has been curator of modern and contemporary art at the Van Beuningen in Rotterdam since 2012, where he designed thematic exhibitions ranging from the historical, such as Brancusi-Rosso-Man Ray Framing Sculpture, Minimal Myth or Richard Serra Drawings, to the experimental such as Le Mirror Vivant by Alex da Corte. He was co-curator, with composer Alexandre Babel, of Latifa Echakhch’s Swiss pavilion at the 59th Venice Biennale and, in 2021, part of the curatorial team of the 34th São Paulo Biennale. Also active on the national scene, he was responsible for the exhibition program of the Memmo Foundation in Rome and the Carriero Foundation in Milan, where he organized numerous monographic exhibitions of contemporary artists.

Recently, he has curated the extensive monograph dedicated to Leandro Erlich at Palazzo Reale in Milan, and in Rome, at the Galleria Borghese, the exhibition Gesti Universali, by Giuseppe Penone.