Cariatide, 1980
GPO-0422
Caryatid
Pencil on paper, collage on paper and on wall, plaster cast
Cast h 182 cm, overall dimensions 182 x 900 cm
Private collection
A large sheet of paper torn along the edges and rolled on the right side around the cast of a Corinthian column is held down on the wall by several fragments of reproductions of Old Master paintings (other fragments are scattered on the surface of the unrolled sheet). Near the column, a male figure appears at the very instant that it is revealed in its entirety, that is, when the rolling of the paper causes his right hand, drawn on the other side of the sheet, to coincide with his corresponding arm.
The key to the title lies in the drawing of the figure. In the artist's own words: “Caryatid subverts the conventional notion of the term, according to which a three-dimensional element serves as a support element for an architectural structure. Here, instead, it is the very architecture that serves as a convenient support for the drawn image, producing the instant during which the body of the figure is joined to the hand and finds stability: in other words, the instant during which the drawing as such achieves its own complete definition. A definition that, among other things, is momentary, given that the way the sheet unfolds presupposes the continuous flow of other countless definitions of other countless drawings”.1
Also related to this is the presence of the torn fragments of the reproductions of earlier works, which aim to evoke the traces of an almost completed itinerary. To this regard Paolini has remarked: “When a work, while wondering about the codes of language, seems to witness its own creation, it uses elements that belonged to other works or not as yet formulated, and it offers a resonance, it alludes to something that is still unfinished. In this sense, there is a continuous relationship between the work and that which preceded it or that constitutes its presumed future. I like to think of the image of the work as a slipping underway, now forwards, now backwards, without ever exactly knowing its definitive status".2
The theme was formulated in a first version in 1979 (GPO-0418), and was then further developed in 1984 (GPO-0516).
1 G. Paolini in conversation with M. Disch (2004), in M. Disch, Giulio Paolini. Catalogo ragionato 1960-1999, vol. 1 (Milan: Skira editore, 2008), cat. no. 418 p. 426.
2 G. Paolini interviewed by J. Lageira, in Digraphe 48 (Paris), June, 1989, p. 131; formulation revisited by the artist, February 2007, Giulio Paolini. La voce del pittore – Scritti e interviste 1965-1995, edited by M. Disch (Lugano: ADV Publishing House, 1995), p. 251.
Pierre-Paul Prud’hon, Jeune homme, marchant, de profil à droite, early 19th century, black chalk and stump with white highlights on blue paper, 59.3 x 36.1 cm, Musée Bonnat-Helleu, Bayonne; reproduction from Dessins français du XIXe siècle du Musée Bonnat à Bayonne. LXIX exposition du Cabinet des Dessin, exhibition catalogue, Paris, Musée du Louvre (Paris: Editions de la Réunion des musées nationaux, 1979), p. 82, plate 112.
| 1980 | Amsterdam, Stedelijk Museum, Giulio Paolini, 10 April - 26 May, touring to: Oxford, The Museum of Modern Art, 8 June - 20 July, not repr. (reproduction of Studio per “Cariatide” on cover). |
| 1982 | Brussels, Palais des Beaux-Arts, Museum Van Hedendaagse Kunst, 16 July - 5 September, entry by N. De Dauw and V.Van Durme pp. 401-403, repr. p. 402 (incompletely dated “1979”). |
| 1985 | Lisboa, Centro de Arte Moderna Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, Exhibition-Dialogue on Contemporary Art in Europe / Exposição-Diálogo sobre a Arte Contemporânea na Europa, 29 March - 16 June, repr. p. 303. |
| 1986 | Charleroi, Palais des Beaux-Arts, Giulio Paolini, 15 February - 30 March, not repr. (same catalogue as for the solo exhibition in Villeurbanne 1984). |
| • | G. Paolini in the interview with J. Lageira, in Digraphe 48 (Paris), June, 1989, p. 131; revised statement by the artist, February 2007, in Italian in Giulio Paolini. La voce del pittore – Scritti e interviste 1965-1995, edited by M. Disch (Lugano: ADV Publishing House, 1995), p. 251. |
| • | G. Paolini in conversation with M. Disch (2004), in M. Disch, Giulio Paolini. Catalogo ragionato 1960-1999 (Milan: Skira editore, 2008), cat. no. 418 p. 426. |
| • | Museum van Hedendaagse Kunst (Ghent: Museum van Hedendaagse Kunst, 1982), entry by N. De Dauw and V. Van Durme pp. 401-403 (in Flemish, French, English, German, incompletely dated “1979”), repr. p. 402; in the attached volume with technical data on the works (Catalogus Van de Verzameling) cited on pp. 38-39 (incompletely dated “1979”). |
| • | Giulio Paolini, exhibition catalogue, Nagoya, Institute of Contemporary Arts, 1987, repr. p. 27. |
| • | Catalogus van de collectie 1988 / Catalogue de la collection 1988 (Ghent: Museum Van Hedendaagse Kunst, 1988), cat. no. 714 p. 224 (incompletely dated “1979”), not repr. |
| • | M. Disch, Giulio Paolini. Catalogo ragionato 1960-1999, vol. 1 (Milan: Skira editore, 2008), cat. no. 422 p. 431, col. repr. (exhibition view Amsterdam 1980). |
| • | Giulio Paolini. A come Accademia, exhibition catalogue, Rome, Accademia Nazionale di San Luca (Rome: Gangemi Editore, 2023), repr. pp. 167 (exhibition view Amsterdam 1980), 184-185 (exhibition view Charleroi 1986). |
| • | S.M.S. Cammarata, “Strappare una foto. Le Cariatidi di Giulio Paolini”, in Studi di scultura. Età moderna e contemporanea 6, no. 6 (Naples), 2024, pp. 277-280, 286, 287, 288, col. repr. p. 278 (exhibition view Amsterdam 1980). |
