Lucio Fontana (Italian, 1899-1968). “Spatial Concept, Expectations”, 1959. Oil on canvas. Olnick Spanu Collection © 2018 Fondazione Lucio Fontana/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York/SIAE, Rome.
Lucio Fontana: On the Threshold – Met Breuer Met Breuer presents ‘Lucio Fontana: On the Threshold’, the first retrospective of the Argentine-Italian artist in the United States in more than four decades. January 23–April 14, 2019.]]>
Source: Met Breuer
The exhibition reassess the legacy of this key postwar figure through a selection of exquisite sculptures, ceramics, paintings, drawings, and environments made between 1931 and 1968. The founder of Spatialism and one of the most innovative artists of the 20th century, Lucio Fontana (1899–1968) is widely known for his series of slashed paintings from 1958 known as the Cuts (Tagli) that became symbols of the postwar era. The exhibition at The Met Breuer presents extraordinary examples of this iconic series, and also explores Fontana’s beginnings as a sculptor and his pioneering work with environments, contextualizing the radical nature of the Cuts within the artist’s broader practice.
”On the Threshold” unpacks Fontana’s approach to painting by reevaluating his work in sculpture and decorative arts. His early career was marked by a period of fertile experimentation, whether challenging sculptural norms in Italy by using clay or actively participating in the Argentine avant-garde, Fontana’s early work from the 1930s and 1940s point toward the transgressive nature of his slashes two decades later. The show presents highlights from this period, including sculptures of women, warriors, and delicate ceramics inspired by undersea imagery.
Through Spatialism, Fontana pursued a synthesis of the arts, and his multidisciplinary approach expanded the notion of the art experience to embrace the surrounding space. He was a pioneer of environments—what he called Ambienti spaziali—and his experiments with light and space, including his use of neon, set the course for exciting future developments in environments and installation art. “On the Threshold” includes the reconstruction of the artist’s monumental neon arabesque Neon Structure for the Ninth Milan Triennial (1951) as well as two immersive installations never before presented in this country: Spatial Environment “Utopias,” at the “Thirteen Milan Triennial” (1964) and “Spatial Environment in Red Light” (1967).
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