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Lot Essay
A rare and important work by Prini, which I pursued for years. With a provenance that testifies to the artist's long-standing and sincere friendship with Lisa Ponti, daughter of Giò Ponti. This work of 1968, called by Lisa and by me Nasone (Big Nose), is a photo-collage on card (the photo depicts part of Prini's face). In this case, the black line dividing the sheet on the right, is not a line drawn in pencil, but two sheets of paper skillfully kept separate (in the lower right, the dedication to Andrea Contini, the artist's cousin, and the date '68).
This work is extremely important to me, because it is a rare trace of a performance by Prini in 1968, for which documentation is found in the first volume on Arte Povera in 1969, curated by Germano Celant; as well as in the catalogue Zero to Infinity. Arte Povera 1962-1972 (Tate Modern and Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, 2001).
In my opinion, Prini's work creates for the viewer an experience that becomes almost the wait for a "conclusion" yet to come, to discover. Most of his works call for a certain effort to recompose the traditional understanding of form and even of meaning. His language is based on concepts and ideas, but for the most part the works remain in the form of projects, or what he refers to as "hypothesis of action". In his tendency to dematerialise the art object, Prini remains an exception among the artists associated with Arte Povera.
This work is extremely important to me, because it is a rare trace of a performance by Prini in 1968, for which documentation is found in the first volume on Arte Povera in 1969, curated by Germano Celant; as well as in the catalogue Zero to Infinity. Arte Povera 1962-1972 (Tate Modern and Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, 2001).
In my opinion, Prini's work creates for the viewer an experience that becomes almost the wait for a "conclusion" yet to come, to discover. Most of his works call for a certain effort to recompose the traditional understanding of form and even of meaning. His language is based on concepts and ideas, but for the most part the works remain in the form of projects, or what he refers to as "hypothesis of action". In his tendency to dematerialise the art object, Prini remains an exception among the artists associated with Arte Povera.