Čís. položky 283


Mario Schifano *


Mario Schifano * - Současné umění I

(Homs/Libya 1934–1998 Rome)
Untitled (Compagni Compagni), c. 1975, signed on the reverse, enamel and pastels on paper laid down on canvas, 123 x 83 cm, framed

This work is registered in the Archivio Mario Schifano, Rome, under no. 03653180120 and is accompanied by a photo certificate of authenticity (dated “second half of the 1970s”)

This work is also registered in the Fondazione Mario Schifano, Rome under no. PM70/142 and is accompanied by photo certificate of authenticity (dated “first half of the 1970s”)

Provenance:
G. Tonelli Collection, Terni
European Private Collection

Literature:
Mario Schifano. A) Opere su tela 1956–1982, Università degli Studi di Genova, p. 157, no. pm70/142 with ill.

This work is part of the famous Compagni Compagni (Comrades Comrades) cycle, started in 1968. In this series of paintings Schifano intercepts and filters his vision of that experience of socialist and communist protest, which appeals to him more on an aesthetic than a political level. In fact, Schifano recounts, in his own style and using his preferred tools, a unique period of history which shortly afterwards (during the 1970s) would see a frustrated and suppressed social struggle give rise to violence and rejection. In that frenetic and tumultuous climate, every kind of artistic or cultural expression – from literature to cinema, from dance to music – was permeated and contaminated with politics.Schifano began his “Pop” journey after a trip to New York in 1962, during which he visited Andy Warhol’s famous Factory. Here, artists from all over the world met and created art with polemical irreverence, denouncing and mocking the very same consumerism that had brought America such success. Schifano, however, would always refuse to be directly linked with American Pop Art: “I made my works at the same time and not following on from the experiences of Pop […]

They were making Pop Art and imposing it almost as if it were a political fact”.
It is, in fact, well-known that the famous hammer and sickle, universal symbols of the struggle of the proletariat and internationalist icons of Communism, were welcomed into Warhol’s Pop repertoire while he was in Rome in 1972. That first example became the template for a series of Hammers and Sickles, created between 1972 and 1976 and then exhibited at the Leo Castelli Gallery in New York in 1977.

However, whereas in his works Warhol “emptied” such symbols of any ideological meaning, turning them into still lifes, Schifano, in his irreverent representation, also included the figures of the struggling proletarians who – in this painting – emerge from a monochrome background of intense red, like rigid and inanimate wooden marionettes. The head of the man on the right even seems to have been “pierced” by another sickle, rendered with a subtle red stroke. Some have attempted in various ways to include Schifano among the ranks of Italian Socialism and Communism. To interpret works such as these as paeans to the aforementioned ideologies would, however, probably be an error. Known for his free and rebellious spirit, Schifano’s true intent was most likely to filter a symbolic image of his time via his own irreverent language, to record fragments of reality on his diary-canvas, famous images that were born out of that intertwining of life and art which always remained at the heart of Mario Schifano’s poetics.

16.05.2018 - 19:00

Dosažená cena: **
EUR 50.000,-
Odhadní cena:
EUR 40.000,- do EUR 60.000,-

Mario Schifano *


(Homs/Libya 1934–1998 Rome)
Untitled (Compagni Compagni), c. 1975, signed on the reverse, enamel and pastels on paper laid down on canvas, 123 x 83 cm, framed

This work is registered in the Archivio Mario Schifano, Rome, under no. 03653180120 and is accompanied by a photo certificate of authenticity (dated “second half of the 1970s”)

This work is also registered in the Fondazione Mario Schifano, Rome under no. PM70/142 and is accompanied by photo certificate of authenticity (dated “first half of the 1970s”)

Provenance:
G. Tonelli Collection, Terni
European Private Collection

Literature:
Mario Schifano. A) Opere su tela 1956–1982, Università degli Studi di Genova, p. 157, no. pm70/142 with ill.

This work is part of the famous Compagni Compagni (Comrades Comrades) cycle, started in 1968. In this series of paintings Schifano intercepts and filters his vision of that experience of socialist and communist protest, which appeals to him more on an aesthetic than a political level. In fact, Schifano recounts, in his own style and using his preferred tools, a unique period of history which shortly afterwards (during the 1970s) would see a frustrated and suppressed social struggle give rise to violence and rejection. In that frenetic and tumultuous climate, every kind of artistic or cultural expression – from literature to cinema, from dance to music – was permeated and contaminated with politics.Schifano began his “Pop” journey after a trip to New York in 1962, during which he visited Andy Warhol’s famous Factory. Here, artists from all over the world met and created art with polemical irreverence, denouncing and mocking the very same consumerism that had brought America such success. Schifano, however, would always refuse to be directly linked with American Pop Art: “I made my works at the same time and not following on from the experiences of Pop […]

They were making Pop Art and imposing it almost as if it were a political fact”.
It is, in fact, well-known that the famous hammer and sickle, universal symbols of the struggle of the proletariat and internationalist icons of Communism, were welcomed into Warhol’s Pop repertoire while he was in Rome in 1972. That first example became the template for a series of Hammers and Sickles, created between 1972 and 1976 and then exhibited at the Leo Castelli Gallery in New York in 1977.

However, whereas in his works Warhol “emptied” such symbols of any ideological meaning, turning them into still lifes, Schifano, in his irreverent representation, also included the figures of the struggling proletarians who – in this painting – emerge from a monochrome background of intense red, like rigid and inanimate wooden marionettes. The head of the man on the right even seems to have been “pierced” by another sickle, rendered with a subtle red stroke. Some have attempted in various ways to include Schifano among the ranks of Italian Socialism and Communism. To interpret works such as these as paeans to the aforementioned ideologies would, however, probably be an error. Known for his free and rebellious spirit, Schifano’s true intent was most likely to filter a symbolic image of his time via his own irreverent language, to record fragments of reality on his diary-canvas, famous images that were born out of that intertwining of life and art which always remained at the heart of Mario Schifano’s poetics.


Horká linka kupujících Po-Pá: 10.00 - 17.00
kundendienst@dorotheum.at

+43 1 515 60 200
Aukce: Současné umění I
Typ aukce: Salónní aukce
Datum: 16.05.2018 - 19:00
Místo konání aukce: Wien | Palais Dorotheum
Prohlídka: 05.05. - 16.05.2018


** Kupní cena vč. poplatku kupujícího a DPH

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