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Lot Essay
"The step from the mirror paintings to theatre—everything is theatre—seems simply natural... It is less a matter of involving the audience, of letting it participate, as to act on its freedom and on its imagination, to trigger similar liberation mechanisms in people." -- Michelangelo Pistoletto
Set against the vast, reflective field of Michelangelo Pistoletto’s Uomo dal cappello giallo e verde, a solitary figure turns away from the viewer seemingly caught in a private moment. Dressed in contemporary farmer’s clothing, the title of the work translates directly to Man with a Yellow and Green Hat. In Pistoletto’s signature mirror works, viewers are invited to move closer to each piece, seeking out more details about the mysterious scenes that fill them. As he or she moves closer to the work, they are transported into a fictional space, and in this case, the viewer begins to appear alongside the farmer even though his back will forever be turned away. In viewing these large-scale works, the viewer must actively participate in them. Pistoletto has said that his mirror paintings could not live without an audience and so, while his mirror painting figures remain frozen in a moment, the physicality of the painting will always change to reflect the constant shifting of the universe—day dawning, night falling and a constant flow of strangers coming and going and moving closer and almost inside the painting.
Pistoletto conceived his legendary “mirror paintings” in the early 1960s during the radical Arte Povera movement in Italy. Literally translated as “Poor Art” because of the use of found and unconventional materials such as rags, newspaper and glass, Arte Povera also included performance art, which in many ways these mirror paintings are. The artist commented on the moment he conceived of using reflective surfaces for his work: “In 1961, on a black background that had been varnished to the point that it reflected, I began to paint my face. I saw it come toward me, detaching itself from the space of an environment in which all things moved, and I was astonished” (M. Pistoletto, quoted in Michelangelo Pistoletto, From One to Many, 1956-1974, exh. cat., Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia, 2011, p. 143).
Set against the vast, reflective field of Michelangelo Pistoletto’s Uomo dal cappello giallo e verde, a solitary figure turns away from the viewer seemingly caught in a private moment. Dressed in contemporary farmer’s clothing, the title of the work translates directly to Man with a Yellow and Green Hat. In Pistoletto’s signature mirror works, viewers are invited to move closer to each piece, seeking out more details about the mysterious scenes that fill them. As he or she moves closer to the work, they are transported into a fictional space, and in this case, the viewer begins to appear alongside the farmer even though his back will forever be turned away. In viewing these large-scale works, the viewer must actively participate in them. Pistoletto has said that his mirror paintings could not live without an audience and so, while his mirror painting figures remain frozen in a moment, the physicality of the painting will always change to reflect the constant shifting of the universe—day dawning, night falling and a constant flow of strangers coming and going and moving closer and almost inside the painting.
Pistoletto conceived his legendary “mirror paintings” in the early 1960s during the radical Arte Povera movement in Italy. Literally translated as “Poor Art” because of the use of found and unconventional materials such as rags, newspaper and glass, Arte Povera also included performance art, which in many ways these mirror paintings are. The artist commented on the moment he conceived of using reflective surfaces for his work: “In 1961, on a black background that had been varnished to the point that it reflected, I began to paint my face. I saw it come toward me, detaching itself from the space of an environment in which all things moved, and I was astonished” (M. Pistoletto, quoted in Michelangelo Pistoletto, From One to Many, 1956-1974, exh. cat., Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia, 2011, p. 143).