For its second year participating in Dallas Art Fair, Simon Lee Gallery is pleased to present a solo booth of works by Claudio Parmiggiani, including five new works made specifically for the occasion.
The work of Claudio Parmiggiani is concerned with themes of absence, fragmentation and silence. Deeply personal meditations on life and death, the power of reflection and feelings of the sacred are realised in sculptures, photographic and painted images, and in his signature ‘Delocazione’. These haunting works use powder, soot and fire to create shadows and imprints on board, resulting in a sense of absence while at the same time making manifest an unmistakable human presence, tangible, yet not corporeal.
In three new ‘Delocazione’, Parmiggiani explores the enduring influence that 20th century Italian painter Giorgio Morandi had on his work. From 1958-1960 Parmiggiani studied at the Istituto di Belle Arti di Modena. During this time he frequented Morandi’s studio in the Via Fondazza in Bologna, working as the artist’s assistant. In Parmiggiani’s works ghostly impressions of earthenware pots, jugs and vases, lined up in rows, pay tribute to Morandi, whose still-life paintings continue to resonate in his former apprentice’s oeuvre. A further two new works feature the fleeting imprint of butterflies – a recurring motif throughout the artist’s practice for its elusive nature – revealing his concern with the inevitable passage of time.
Accompanying the ‘Delocazione’ is a series of ‘black mirror’ wall based works – shattered black glass that resembles telescopic windows onto the cosmos. Jewel-like, cracked, shimmering surfaces reveal hypnotic voids and galaxies, embodying the act of violence in their own creation. Evoking a tension between the man-made and the natural world, between matter and thought, these shimmering worlds hold the promise of a refracted eternity.
Claudio Parmiggiani was born in Luzzara, Italy in 1943 and lives and works in Parma, Italy. Parmiggiani’s work has been widely exhibited in international museums and collections. His work has been shown six times at the Biennale di Venezia, Venice, Italy (1972, 1982, 1984, 1986, 1995 and 2015). A retrospective of his practice between 1960 and 1995 was held at the Musée d’Art Moderne et Contemporain, Geneva, Switzerland (1995). Recent solo exhibitions have been held at Simon Lee Gallery, London, UK (2017); Accademia di Francia Villa Medici, Rome, Italy (2015); Palais des Beaux Arts - BOZAR, Brussels, Belgium (2013); Collège des Bernardins, Paris, France (2008); The Musée des Beaux-arts de Nantes, Nantes, France (2007); The Grand Palais, Paris, France (2005); Galleria d’Arte Moderna di Bologna, Bologna, Italy (2003); Museum of Art, Tel-Aviv, Israel (2003) and Musée Fabre, Montpellier, France (2002). His work is held in the collections of Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris, France; Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands; Museo de Bellas Artes of Havana, Havana, Cuba; The National Gallery of Iceland, Reykjavík, Iceland; Mamco - musée d'art moderne et contemporain, Geneva, Switzerland; Fondation Cartier pour l'art contemporain, Paris, France; François Pinault Foundation, Venice, Italy and Museo del Novecento, Milan, Italy.
