Ferrara, Palazzo dei Diamanti, March 14 – July 19, 2026
Ferrara is preparing to host an international event in the spring of 2026. It marks the 50th anniversary of the landmark Ladies and Gentlemen exhibition of 1975-76, which brought one of the most charismatic figures of the twentieth century to Palazzo dei Diamanti: Andy Warhol.
To celebrate the event, masterpieces by the father of pop art will be displayed in the same venue. It will not only be an exhibition about Warhol, but a re-edition of the transgressive show that Warhol himself presented in Italy, which marked a turning point in his production and the art of the time. With Ladies and Gentlemen, the artist for the first time chose anonymous African-American and Puerto Rican drag queens as the protagonists of his work, rather than icons of the society of spectacle like Marilyn Monroe and Liz Taylor, on whom he had focused until then, shifting the focus to the individual and their identity. A new energy emerges from those vivid and exuberant portraits, giving life to a colorful gallery of glam-queer effigies that seem to herald the aesthetic trends of the third millennium.
The exhibition “Andy Warhol. Ladies and Gentlemen,” conceived and organized by the Ferrara Arte Foundation and the Gallerie d’Arte Moderna e Contemporanea di Ferrara, boasts the prestigious support of the Andy Warhol Museum in Pittsburgh. Palazzo dei Diamanti once again hosts some of the great artist’s most provocative creations, in an immersive reenactment of the 1975-76 exhibition accompanied by a fascinating journey into the universe of Warhol’s portraiture. The exhibition offers an exceptional selection of over 150 portraits, including acrylics, drawings, silkscreens, and Polaroids, from important European and American museums and collections.
An extensive narrative dedicated to the Ladies and Gentlemen series is followed by a selection of some of the most iconic portraits and self-portraits produced between the 1960s and 1980s: from the Marilyn series, which codified the archetype of the star, to the parody of the official iconography of Mao Zedong, from the silhouettes of Mick Jagger and Liza Minnelli, global emblems of uninhibited and theatrical sensuality, to the fluid and dematerialized effigies of Robert Mapplethorpe and Grace Jones, which heralded the advent of digital imaging, culminating in a spectacular room of self-portraits with which the artist explores the boundaries of his own identity.
The exhibition traces the stages of Warhol’s radical reinvention of the traditional portrait, borrowing from the codes of mass communication, technological aesthetics, the idioms of glam rock and camp culture, amateur images taken with Polaroid cameras, the language of film, and even reality television. The public will be able to immerse themselves in the creative process of Warhol’s genius, thanks to a large collection of acrylic paintings, many of which have never been shown in Italy before, and a review of the various media the artist experimented with. Films and photographs enrich the narrative, bringing the artist to life in the rooms of Palazzo dei Diamanti, as well as the unique energy of the pop scene whose legend Warhol embodied.
/ Information and reservations
Tel. 0532 244949 | diamanti@comune.fe.it
/ Press Office
Studio Esseci
Simone Raddi | simone@studioesseci.net
+39 049 663499 | M. +39 347 0481694
The exhibition will be open daily from 9:30 am to 7:30 pm; also open November 1st, December 8th, December 25th and 26th, and January 1st.
The ticket office will close at 6:30 pm, last admission.
(The ticket office closes 45 minutes earlier.)
Press office
communication.ferrararte@comune.fe.it | tel. 340 4190867
Information and reservations for exhibitions and museums in Ferrara
0532 244949 /// diamanti@comune.fe.it /// www.palazzodiamanti.it
http://www.castelloestense.it
Contacts – Estense Castle – Largo Castello
tel. 0532 419180
castelloestense@comune.fe.it
10.00-18.00. Last entry 5.15pm. Closed on Tuesday.
Free admission with MyFeCard