“… ma un’estensione”. Gastini, Icaro, Mattiacci, Spagnulo

In line with the traditional attention shown by Ca’ Pesaro to the crossroads between sculpture and painting, this exhibition offers the opportunity for a fascinating dialectic comparison between the works of four great exponents of Italian contemporary art who, despite working in very different styles and means of expression, present a series of profound affinities.

As Bruno Corà writes: “Despite the evident differences distinguishing each of their work, in their sculpture and painting they share and implement the principles prophesied by Medardo Rosso and, later, by Umberto Boccioni (‘we shall put the observer at the centre of the picture’) and Arturo Martini, who had wished sculpture to have a different vocation: ‘I wish it to be not an object but an extension’. In this way, and despite following in the wake of an Italian tradition that has never died out, the four artists independently renew and amplify these linguistic aspirations, affirming their work in a context that is European and international”.

Bound by long-standing friendships – Marco Gastini with his continuous dialectic between painting, matter and virtual and real space, Paolo Icaro, who in his work provokes a crisis for any form of rejection and heaviness, Eliseo Mattiacci, who has abandoned the monumentality of sculpture by undercutting it at its base, and Giuseppe Spagnulo, who boldly defies gravity in matter and confers lightness to the most powerful of sculptures – the artists create a fresh, intense dialogue at Ca’ Pesaro that involves art and life.