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Massimo Poldelmengo
IT

Biography

Pordenone, 1964. Lives and works in Friuli, Italy.

Massimo Poldelmengo was born in Pordenone in 1964. In 1985 he enrolled in the painting course at the Accademia di Belle Arti in Venice and in 1988 took part in Arteveneto — 73rd Group Exhibition at the Galleria Bevilacqua La Masa in Venice, where he was awarded a scholarship on merit. It was the beginning of a series of exhibitions promoted by the Venetian institution, which kept him engaged until at least 1992.

During his final academic year he went to Spain, where he attended the Faculty of Fine Arts in Madrid and exhibited in the group show Artisti italiani (1989). Back in Friuli in the 1990s, he took part in several editions of Hicetnunc, the contemporary art festival in San Vito al Tagliamento. After Nuove Contaminazioni, organised in Udine in 1996 by the Galleria d'Arte Moderna, his works entered the civic collections of Udine and the collection of the Fondazione Teatro Nuovo Giovanni da Udine.

Because of his ability to engage with architectural space, in 2007 he worked alongside the Pordenone architect Davide Raffin on the parish complex of the Church of the Sacro Cuore di Gesù in Baragalla (Reggio Emilia), winner in 2006 of the competition launched by the Italian Episcopal Conference (CEI). The artist was entrusted with the stained-glass window, the main door, the baptismal font and the tabernacle.

In 2009 he won the Premio In Sesto. Sculpture and installation in urban space, part of the fourth edition of Palinsesti in San Vito al Tagliamento, with a winning project of a ladder emerging from a well, installed in the Corte del Castello. The following year an exhibition of the drawings and models for the church in Reggio Emilia was held at the Gallerie del Progetto in Palazzo Valvason Morpurgo, Udine.

In 2012 he took part in Contemporanea/mente in Pordenone (GAMC Armando Pizzinato), Gradisca d'Isonzo (Galleria Spazzapan) and Trieste (Museo Revoltella). In autumn 2013, for the anniversary of the Edict of Constantine, the Municipality of Aquileia, the Fondazione Aquileia and the cultural association "Venti d'arte" organised the retrospective Poldelmengo. L'opera del prima in Aquileia, devoted to the recurring themes of his research: temporality, the relationship with music and the dialogue with Christian symbolism. In 2014 the Galleria Spazzapan in Gradisca invited him to show XVI and L'impronta del XVI, on the relationship between design and execution in monumental sculpture. In 2016 "Venti d'arte" devoted a solo exhibition to him at the Rome representative office of the Friuli Venezia Giulia Region.

In 2017 he took part in Archetipi, Simbologie e Trasformazioni (Fondazione Ado Furlan, Pordenone) and created Time at the Stamperia d'Arte Albicocco in Udine, a series of large-format prints of strong emotional intensity. In 2018 he exhibited at Casa Cavazzini in Udine in the group show Nel tempo and at the Galleria Sagittaria in Pordenone in Sembra un quadro, sembra una foto; in the same year he won the competition for a work for the Trieste Airport intermodal hub in Ronchi dei Legionari.

Since 2023 he has taught Techniques and Technologies of the Visual Arts at the Accademia di Belle Arti G.B. Tiepolo in Udine. In 2025 he created the Memorial to the civilian victims of the 1945 bombings in Casarsa della Delizia, installed in the town cemetery.

Public collections

Public competitions won

Writings on his work

Francesca Agostinelli, Bruno Corà, Angelo Bertani, Maria Campitelli, Guido Cecere, Diego Collovini, Guido Comis, Fulvio Dell'Agnese, Ernesto L. Francalanci, Vania Gransinigh, Italo and Caterina Furlan, Gianpaolo Gri, Alessandro Del Puppo, Giancarlo Pauletto, Isabella Reale, Alessandra Santin, Roberto Tagliaferri, Chiara Tavella, Federico Vercellone.