Senza titolo, 1967
GPE-0001
Untitled
Coloured die-cut paper and collage
50 x 50.5 cm
Signed and dated on the verso, upper left: “Giulio Paolini 1967”
Handwritten numbering, not by the artist, on the verso, upper right
123 in Arabic numerals from 1/123 to 123/123
Each edition is distinguished by a different paper colour.
Ed.912, Milan
The print is part of the activity of the Milanese publishing house Ed.912, founded in 1966 by Gianni-Emilio Simonetti, Gianni Sassi, and Sergio Albergoni, and active until 1969. In 1967, Ed.912 produced a series of prints having the same format (50 x 50 cm or 50 x 70 cm) and edition size, commissioned from the artists Valerio Adami, Alighiero Boetti, Aldo Mondino, Ugo Nespolo, Giulio Paolini, Gianfranco Pardi, Paolo Scheggi, Gianni-Emilio Simonetti, Emilio Tadini, and Renato Volpini.
The cut-out shape of the artist’s right hand intent on drawing, cut from a sheet of coloured paper, is applied to the right side of a sheet of the same colour. The hand extends just slightly beyond the edge, thereby emphasizing its gesture.
The hand holding a pencil and the surface of the sheet of paper that is still unblemished evoke the moment that comes before the appearance of an image, and therefore the forming of a vision: the moment of the planning, when everything is still possible. The contact between the hand and the sheet, via the pencil, announces the quest for a drawing, that is, the potential becoming of an image.
This iconographic theme was conceived between 1966 and 1967 with several original versions in various formats and colours, in which the shape of the hand was cut out with scissors (cf. the works on paper GPC-0057, GPC-0171, GPC-0087, GPC-0088, GPC-0089, GPC-0117, GPC-2202); these were followed in 1972-73 by two variants in which sheets of graph paper in millimetres were used (GPC-0214, GPC-0262). From the late 1970s onward the motif of the hand drawing was developed further, with the same drawn shape as well as with images of other hands (as concerns the print editions cf. GPE-0035, GPE-0047, GPE-0050, GPE-0056, GPE-0075, GPE-0134, GPE-0135).
| 1992 | Bonn, Bonner Kunstverein, Giulio Paolini. Impressions graphiques. Das graphische Werk 1967-1992, 24 February - 29 March (catalogue Impressions graphiques. L’opera grafica 1967-1992 di Giulio Paolini [Turin: Marco Noire Editore, 1992], cat. no. 1). |
| 1993 | Winterthur, Kunstmuseum Winterthur, Giulio Paolini. Impressions graphiques. Das druckgraphische Werk 1967-1992, 16 January - 7 March (catalogue Impressions graphiques. L’opera grafica 1967-1992 di Giulio Paolini [Turin: Marco Noire Editore, 1992], cat. no. 1). |
| 1995 | Lisbon, Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian / Centro de Arte Moderna José de Azeredo Perdigão, Giulio Paolini. Impressions graphiques. Múltiplos e Obra Gráfica 1969-1995, 16 March - 28 May, not repr. in the exhibition brochure (catalogue Impressions graphiques. L’opera grafica 1967-1992 di Giulio Paolini [Turin: Marco Noire Editore, 1992], cat. no. 1). |
| 1996 | Apolda, Kunsthaus Apolda Avantgarde, Giulio Paolini. Impressions graphiques, 27 September - 27 October (catalogue Impressions graphiques. L’opera grafica 1967-1992 di Giulio Paolini [Turin: Marco Noire Editore, 1992], cat. no. 1). |
| 1997 | Göppingen, Kunsthalle, Giulio Paolini. Impressions graphiques. Das graphische Druckwerk 1967-1995, 9 March - 13 April (catalogue Impressions graphiques. L’opera grafica 1967-1992 di Giulio Paolini [Turin; Marco Noire Editore, 1992], cat. no. 1). |
| 2004 | Amsterdam, Galerie A / Harry Ruhé, Anselmo, Boetti, Calzolari, Chiari, Costa, De Maria, Desiato, Fontana, Kounellis, Mattiacci, Merz, Miccini, Munari, Paolini, Pistoletto, Rotella, Spagnulo, Zorio, 12 June - 15 July; yellow edition. |
| 2006 | Turin, Galleria “èArte”, Paolini, Penone, Pistoletto, 7 February - 18 March. |
| 2018-19 | Turin, Mastio della Cittadella, 100% Italia. Cent’anni di capolavori, 21 September 2018 - 10 February 2019, col. repr. p. 608 (erroneously titled “La mano”). |
| 2019 | Turin, Biasutti & Biasutti, Multipli. Anselmo, Boetti, Fabro, Gilardi, Paolini, Pascali, Penone, Pistoletto, Salvo, 21 March - 27 April. |
| • | G. Brizio, “Giulio Paolini ovvero ‘quam raptim ad sublimia’", in Graphicus 52, no. 10 (Turin), October, 1971, repr. on cover. |
| • | G. Paolini, Idem (Turin: Giulio Einaudi editore, 1975), repr. p. 31 (cropped on the right side), new edition (Milan: Electa, 2023), repr. p. 57 (cropped on the right side). |
| • | Impressions graphiques. L’opera grafica 1967-1992 di Giulio Paolini (Turin: Marco Noire Editore, 1992), cat. no. 1, repr. (cropped on the right side; edition size mentioned as 50, no indication of the edition size of 123 in the unpaginated list of works). |
| • | I. Bernardi, Giulio Paolini. Opere su carta: un laboratorio gestuale per la percezione dell’immagine (Turin: Prinp Editore, 2017), repr. p. 182. |
| • | F. Boragina, Editoria e controcultura: la storia dell’Ed.912 (Milan: Postmedia, 2021), p. 107, repr. |
