Carla Accardi: The Seventies: Lenzuoli

After World War II, she contributed to establishing non-figurative art in Italy by co-founding the Forma 1 abstract group in 1947 – the only woman in an entirely male cohort. In the 1950s she focused on signs, becoming one of the protagonists of Michel Tapié’s art autre. In the following decade she began to use sicofoil, a new transparent plastic material, and abandoned tempera in favour of coloured and fluorescent paints, opening up her work to optical and environmental effects.

During the 1970s she became committed to social activities and feminism: in 1970 she was one of the founders of Rivolta Femminile (Female Revolt) alongside Carla Lonzi and Elvira Banotti. At the start of the new millennium she showed a renewed interest in painting, constantly developing her own visual language, composed of signs and chromatic juxtapositions.