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Emilio Tadini
Dopo la sei giorni, 1965
Tempera and wax on canvas
100 x 81 cm
Dopo la sei giorni, 1965
Tempera and wax on canvas
100 x 81 cm
Press Release
Tadini 1960-1985.
L’occhio della pittura
Opening: 30 October, 2007
31 October – December 20, 2007
L’occhio della pittura
Opening: 30 October, 2007
31 October – December 20, 2007
The Marconi Foundation is pleased to announce the exhibition Emilio Tadini 1960-1985. L'occhio della pittura, with works comprised between 1975 and 1985.
"Text" is the protagonist of some of the works on display and Testo is also the title of a work, appearing both as a graphic sign and as a real text. Embraced by pen and brush and surrounded by spots of colour, it reveals Tadini's dual identity of painter and writer.
In these works, as well as in Parade, words seen as images and images themselves are put on the same level so that the surface of the canvas becomes the meeting point for different and complementary languages.
If the canvas is a metaphoric meeting place for words and images, the Atelier is the physical place where this fundamental meeting occurs, where you can “take the bait”, as the hook at the centre of the painting may suggest.
The atelier therefore becomes a think-tank where ideas materialise into images and words and where the artist (whose presence is symbolised by a head on a pedestal) seems to be a Renaissance personality: versatile and multifaceted.
Some works on display are dedicated to the masters of the past: Michelangelo and La montagna Saint-Victoire, Cézanne's favourite subject, a tribute to the artist considered the father of modern art, where the Provencal mountain landscape is represented by the corner of a canvas seen from the back.
In Le mani di Renoir, instead, the instability of the brush and the wheeling-chair are probably a reference to the health conditions of the French painter in the last period of his life, but it may also be a metaphor for the present situation of painting.
"Text" is the protagonist of some of the works on display and Testo is also the title of a work, appearing both as a graphic sign and as a real text. Embraced by pen and brush and surrounded by spots of colour, it reveals Tadini's dual identity of painter and writer.
In these works, as well as in Parade, words seen as images and images themselves are put on the same level so that the surface of the canvas becomes the meeting point for different and complementary languages.
If the canvas is a metaphoric meeting place for words and images, the Atelier is the physical place where this fundamental meeting occurs, where you can “take the bait”, as the hook at the centre of the painting may suggest.
The atelier therefore becomes a think-tank where ideas materialise into images and words and where the artist (whose presence is symbolised by a head on a pedestal) seems to be a Renaissance personality: versatile and multifaceted.
Some works on display are dedicated to the masters of the past: Michelangelo and La montagna Saint-Victoire, Cézanne's favourite subject, a tribute to the artist considered the father of modern art, where the Provencal mountain landscape is represented by the corner of a canvas seen from the back.
In Le mani di Renoir, instead, the instability of the brush and the wheeling-chair are probably a reference to the health conditions of the French painter in the last period of his life, but it may also be a metaphor for the present situation of painting.
In the works from the end of the Seventies, images and words interweave on the canvas, sometimes conflicting as in Natura morta con la parola fine some others being complementary as in Culto.
Merging the two poles, words and images, generates a dense web of quotes and allusions that make it difficult to decypher Tadini's painting, the most abstract among figurative painters.
In the series Il posto dei piccoli valori, words leave room to the little objects that set the rhythm of our life: once the great values have been lost, Tadini puts in evidence the value of the little things of life.
In the series Disordine di un corpo classico, objects are replaced by the human figure that becomes protagonist of the painting. In the shape of a dummy it has nothing human, indeed, it is a flattened bluish monster showing an ambiguous and unreal image of the body.
A reference to classical art is provided by fragments of arms and legs that, scattered on the canvas as if they were archaeological findings, are arranged in a “disorderly” manner.
The exhibition has been organised in collaboration with the Provincia di Milano, Assessorato alla Cultura, the Marconi and Mudima Foundations, the Brera Academy of Fine Arts and Archivio Emilio Tadini with the patronage of Comune di Milano, Assessorato alla Cultura.
A catalogue will be published by Skira to mark this occasion, with about 304 pages it will include an introductory text by Vittorio Fagone and a large selection of critical documents of the time and most recent ones, focusing on Tadini's work from the beginning to 1985.
Merging the two poles, words and images, generates a dense web of quotes and allusions that make it difficult to decypher Tadini's painting, the most abstract among figurative painters.
In the series Il posto dei piccoli valori, words leave room to the little objects that set the rhythm of our life: once the great values have been lost, Tadini puts in evidence the value of the little things of life.
In the series Disordine di un corpo classico, objects are replaced by the human figure that becomes protagonist of the painting. In the shape of a dummy it has nothing human, indeed, it is a flattened bluish monster showing an ambiguous and unreal image of the body.
A reference to classical art is provided by fragments of arms and legs that, scattered on the canvas as if they were archaeological findings, are arranged in a “disorderly” manner.
The exhibition has been organised in collaboration with the Provincia di Milano, Assessorato alla Cultura, the Marconi and Mudima Foundations, the Brera Academy of Fine Arts and Archivio Emilio Tadini with the patronage of Comune di Milano, Assessorato alla Cultura.
A catalogue will be published by Skira to mark this occasion, with about 304 pages it will include an introductory text by Vittorio Fagone and a large selection of critical documents of the time and most recent ones, focusing on Tadini's work from the beginning to 1985.