(Milan 1930–2004)
Volume a moduli sfasati, 1960, signed, titled and dated Dadamaino, 1960 and inscribed 20159 Milano, Via Bitonto 24, on the stretcher, die-cut plastic laid on two stretchers, 122 x 122 cm, in original frame, (AR)

Photo certificate:
Archivio Dadamaino, Milan, 1 March 2011, archive no. 48/11

Provenance:
Grossetti Arte Contemporanea, Milan (stamp on the reverse, no. 13938)
European Private Collection

Literature:
Flaminio Gualdoni, Luca Massimo Barbero, Marco Vallora, Bernhard Blistene, Dadamaino, Volumi 1958–1960, catalogue of the homonimous exhibition held at Studio Guastalla Arte Moderna e Contemporanea, 29 May – 27 September 2014, pp. 70–71, no. 22 with ill.

I had to and I wished to free myself from Matter,
I could not stand its weight,
for me it was a burden,
a tie with tradition and I wanted variation, mobility, vibrations…
But above all I wanted transparency
and I found it in an industrial material that for many was for domestic use…
I had made a grid packed with holes and I needed transparency…
I used the plastic material from which shower curtains are made, that is to say,
a material that is far from noble, but which was ideally suited to my goal and to my idea…
many of my ways of feeling and creating art originated from there...
I was interested in offset weaves,
their alternating rhythm...

[...] Then I began working collectively in the Gruppo N and, in May 1961, Dada was invited to Padua to exhibit in our workshop, the Studio Enne. She displayed the “Volumi a moduli sfasati“ (Volumes of displaced modules) for the first time. On seeing these latest works of huge scale, with innumerable tiny holes punched by hand in plastic sheets – the famous shower curtains – I became aware of the grandiosity of her work and I stopped making the “Trame“ (Grids), which I had created by layering small pieces of punctured paper. [...] In substance, the layers created by Dada seemed to me less playful, more engaged than my own. I therefore left to her the development of the concept and I dedicated myself to the creative process of “Rilievi ottico-dinamici“ [Optical-Dynamic reliefs].
(Alberto Biasi in “Dadamaino. Gli anni ‘50 e ‘60, la capacità di sognare“, Cortina Arte, Milan, 2010)