Orfano e celibe, 2016
GPE-0133
Orphan and Celibate
Die-cut plates and pencil drawing
Two plates 40 x 30 cm each
Signed on the recto of the first panel of each plate, bottom centre: “Giulio Paolini”
Autograph numbering on the recto of the first panel of each plate, bottom centre
50 in Arabic numerals from 1/50 to 50/50
21 in alphabetical letters from A/Z to Z/Z
100 in Roman numerals from I/C to C/C
7 ad personam from adp 1/7 to adp 7/7
Edizioni Colophon, Belluno
Cut-outs by Guerrino Giacomazzi and Silvio Antiga
The print was produced for the book by Paolini titled Orfano e celibe, published by Edizioni Colophon, Belluno, founded in 1985 and directed by Egidio Fiorin.
Giulio Paolini, Orfano e celibe (Belluno-Venice: Edizioni Colophon, 2016). 40 x 30 cm, 66 pages, paper binding. Writings in verse by the author, followed by notes to the texts, no illustrations. Edition without plates: with softcover and dust jacket, 100 copies in Roman numerals. Edition with plates separate from the text: hardcover binding with fabric back; slightly smaller sheet of 100% cotton Amatraduda paper applied to the front cover with titles in black, 78 copies in Arabic numbers, in letters and ad personam.
The colophon of the book includes information regarding the font, printer, type of paper, edition size, plates, binding, and printing date ("nel giorno di Santa Emma di Sassonia vedova dell’A.D. 2016”). Numbering bottom centre.
Twenty-nine writings in verse by the artist (1990-2016), collected in one volume, followed by a section of Notes with an anthology of texts in prose, whose titles refer to some of the compositions in verse on the previous pages.
The two die-cut plates, inserted at the beginning and the end of the volume of writings by the artist titled Orfano e celibe, portray the outline of the half-bust of a male figure. The plates have two panels, so that the die-cut figure – in the first panel – is silhouetted against the complete background of the second panel, in one case so that it is positive (full shape), and in another so that it is negative (empty shape).1 The figure appears to be included in a rectangle outlined in pencil, traced in the second panel in the case of the positive outline and in the first panel in the case of the negative outline.
Akin to the texts in the book, the two accompanying plates refer to the figure of the author, "orphan and celibate", as the title tells us. Free from all restrictions, absent, in exile with respect to the world and life, as well as with respect to the work that pre-exists and transcends him: hence, the two anonymous shapes, mere extras, voiceless and weightless.
1 The first panel for each plate comes with a flap, which, when the book is closed, is roll folded, thus closing the two panels.
| 2016 | Turin, Norma Mangione, Studio Salvo, Francesco Barocco / Giulio Paolini, 24 September - 29 November; edition D/Z. |
| • | E. Fiorin, “Introduzione”, in Colophon 55 (Belluno), March, 2021, p. 5, not repr. |
| • | Vola alta, parola. I libri d’artista delle Edizioni Colophon 2015-2022 (Belluno: Colophonarte, 2022), p. 32 (anonymous entry), col. repr. no. E18 pp. 32-33 (edition 39/50). |
