NEW YORK, NY.- Colnaghi announced a joint exhibition with Carlo Bella, Power Figures, opening on the 27th of May and running until the 6th of June. The presentation will feature museum-quality historical African and Native American artworks alongside Old Master Paintings and works from Greco-Roman Antiquity.

Taking its title from the term ‘Power Figure,’ used in African Art to denote ancestral statues and reliquaries that served as instruments for protecting, healing and administering justice in tribal communities, this exhibition aims to investigate artworks as sites of memory, legacy, and convention, and to create dialogues between artistic traditions that speak to the significance of human representation in the formation and maintenance of cultural tradition.

Carlo Bella will present twenty important pieces of African and Native American Art. A highlight of the showcase is a large fetish figure from the Songye Culture, formerly in the collection of New York art dealer Allan Stone. This imposing nkishi figure features a cavity on the top of the head and one in the abdomen housing medicinal charges that allowed the figure to become a conduit for spiritual interaction and community protection. The carving is covered by a palm oil patina, sprinkled on the figure as it was paraded through the village during ritual processions.

Colnaghi will present a selection of European portrait paintings, as well as Classical Antiquities. Showing in America for the first time in history, the imposing full-length, life-sized Portrait of a Noblewoman by the most important of the Neapolitan Caravaggisti, Giovanni Battista Caracciolo (Naples 1578 – 1635 Naples), will be a highlight of the showcase. The portrait depicts a Genoese noble woman in a sumptuous gown in the Spanish style and an elaborate coiffure. Her unmarried status is subtly indicated by a lace-bordered handkerchief in her left hand. The Portrait of a Noble woman is at present the only attributed full-length portrait by Caracciolo.

Power Figures will be on view at Colnaghi New York, 23 East 67th Street, 4th Floor, New York, NY 10065 from the 27th of May to the 6th of June 2025.

Carlo Bella is a leading international art dealer specialising in the traditional art of Africa, Oceania and the Americas who hails from Milan, Italy, where his family of art dealers, artists and collectors fuelled his love of art. In 1982, he graduated from NYU with a degree in political science and art history and joined Pace a year later. In 1986, Carlo created the Old Master Print department at Pace Prints, which he ran until 2002 when he became the Director of Pace African & Oceanic Art. Drawing on his knowledge and collecting of African Art and Oceanic Art for over 40 years, Carlo led the gallery into the 21st century, adapting to an ever-changing art market.