Paolo Masi
Cardboards since 1977
December 1 2022 - January 20, 2023
ABOUT KROMYA
KROMYA ART GALLERY viene fondata nel 2018 a Lugano da Tecla Riva, Giorgio Ferrarin e Adriano A. Sala come risultato di una passione e di competenze comuni di lunga data. Nel 2020 KROMYA ha ampliato la propria sede con un nuovo avamposto a Verona, in Italia
From December 1st, 2022 to January 20th, 2023, the KROMYA Art Gallery in Lugano hosted the exhibition Cardboards since 1977 by Paolo Masi, a Florentine artist of international fame.
The exhibition presented thirty mixed media works on cardboard, made from 1970 to the present day, with the addition of some unpublished works. Among the exhibited works, there were also some sculptures that transcended the apparent two-dimensionality of the works on cardboard, a real new stimulus for Masi, consistent with his artistic path. Color was the absolute protagonist of this new production, linking the individual paintings together in the construction of a new syntax.
As Carlo Vanoni’s text in the catalogue published by Vanilla Edizioni reads, Paolo Masi’s new works are a continuation of a path that began in the early 1970s, which saw cardboard as a surface to work on. Today, more than fifty years later, the analytical approach would appear anachronistic. For this reason, during his journey, Masi had already introduced color on the bare surface of cardboard. And it is precisely color, and therefore painting, that is the protagonist of these new works.
Paolo Masi was born in Florence in 1933, where he lives and works. After elaborating in the 1950s and 1960s an articulated, complex, and diversified activity, he approached contextual analytical-reductive experiences, decomposing and reorganizing on the floor and against the walls aluminum astedi, mirrors, wires, or small colored plexiglass sticks, which also extend to the third dimension the rhythm of “space-color.” He participated in the Venice Biennale (1978); in the XI Roman Quadrennial (1986); in the “Kunstlerbücher” exhibitions in Frankfurt and “Erweiterte Fotographie Wiener Secession” in Vienna (1980); in the Parisian exhibition on the artist’s book (Centre Georges Pompidou, 1985), in “Arte in Toscana 1945-2000” (Palazzo Strozzi, Florence, Palazzo Fabroni, Pistoia, 2002), and in the exhibition “Pittura Analitica. I percorsi italiani 1970-1980” (Museo della Permanente, Milan, 2007).
In 2018, the MA*GA Museum in Gallarate dedicated an anthological exhibition to him, Paolo Masi. Doppio Spazio, curated by Lorenzo Bruni, and Le Murate. Progetti Arte Contemporanea, a contemporary art center of the Municipality of Florence, produced the exhibition Paolo Masi. QUI, curated by Valentina Gensini, commissioning 12 monumental works specifically conceived and realized for the monumental complex.
The exhibition Cardboards since 1977 by Paolo Masi was a unique opportunity to admire the works of one of the greatest Italian contemporary artists and appreciate his artistic evolution over the years.
Paolo Masi
Cardboards since 1977
December 1 2022 - January 20 2023
ABOUT KROMYA
KROMYA ART GALLERY viene fondata nel 2018 a Lugano da Tecla Riva, Giorgio Ferrarin e Adriano A. Sala come risultato di una passione e di competenze comuni di lunga data. Nel 2020 KROMYA ha ampliato la propria sede con un nuovo avamposto a Verona, in Italia
