NICOLA DE MARIA FROM THE VENICE BIENNALE 1990
Nicola De Maria From the Venice Biennale 1990
LONDON 41 & 43 Maddox St., W1S 2PD – UK +44 20 74 93 6009 MILANO Corso di Porta Nuova 46/B, 20121 – IT +39 02 36756539 LUGANO Via Frasca 5, 6900 – CH +41 91 92 14 000
Nicola De Maria , From the Venice, Biennale 1990 Ahead of the opening of the 57th International Art Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia, Cortesi Gallery is delighted to announce the launch of a new space in Milan, with an exhibition dedicated to Italian Transavanguardia artist, Nicola De Maria. The show brings together the five monumental canvases created by De Maria on the occasion of his participation at the Venice Biennale in 1990, and pays tribute to the biennial and the artists who took part in it over the years. Milan is the third location of Cortesi Gallery. Founder and director Stefano Cortesi, together with his sons Andrea and Lorenzo, opened the first branch in Lugano in 2013, followed by a gallery in London in 2015. “The decision to open in Milan draws on the necessity of meeting Italian collectors’ needs and tap into the ever-expanding international audience,attracted to the city by its wide offering of popular events and the growing number of museums and private foundations,” said Andrea and Lorenzo Cortesi. “For us, it is an important return and homage to our Milanese roots and the new 350-squaremetre space will offer unprecedented possibilities in terms of display”. Since its inaugural exhibition in Lugano, Italian Art ‘60-’90, which presented works by modern masters such as Agostino Bonalumi, Enrico Castellani and Lucio Fontana - Cortesi Gallery has always developed its programme with input from art experts, curators and institutions, in Italy and abroad (Zero Foundation, Museum of Contemporary Art in Zagreb, Paolo Scheggi Archive, Agostino Bonalumi Archive, Raccolta Lercaro, to name a few).
Cortesi Gallery also presented the first UK retrospectives of Grazia Varisco and Gianfranco Pardi, as well as of Croatian artist, Ivan Picelj. “I have decided to turn mypassion for art into a business”, stated founder and director Stefano Cortesi, who comes from a background in finance. “I feel confident to say that we left a very positive mark in the art scene in terms of research, quality of exhibitions and presence at fairs. Initially, we decided to focus solely on the most historicised post-war period, from the 1950s to the 1960s, which is also a time of great innovation in art. Over the past years, this particular sector has recorded a strong market interest, allowing us to exhibit well-known artists, as well as doing research on other artists like Paolo Scheggi – who at the time we started showing his pieces, lacked due recognition – and we have contributed to their rise in value. As a gallery, we reached a remarkable visibility very quickly: now, having opened an outpost in London and consolidated our position on the European scene, we decided to turn to Milan, and in doing so we chose to expand further our exhibition offering. We have always focused on artists who have pursued an optical, kinetic and geometric theme, now we want to lookat painting and colour.
Over the years, we have noticed a loss of interest in the exponents of Transavanguardia from the market and some dealers who followed their careers and promoted them in the 80s and 90s. We strongly believe in the quality of their work and we will endeavor to give adequate visibility to artists of this movement.” Nicola De Maria is one of the protagonists of the Italian Transavanguardia, a movement defined in the mid-70s by art historian and critic Achille Bonito Oliva. An expression of transition, the Transavanguardia abandoned the avant-gardes’ positivism and certainties in favour of cultural nomadism, stylistic eclecticism and a rehabilitation of painting and manners, both abstract and figurative, freely condensed in the same work. In 1990, De Maria was invited for the third time to participate in the Venice Biennale, and exhibited at the Italian Pavilion alongside Giovanni Anselmo, Alighiero Boetti, Dadamaino, Gino De Dominicis, Alberto Garutti, Giuseppe Maraniello, Carlo Maria Mariani, Vettor Pisani and others. The curators, Laura Cherubini, Flaminio Gualdoni and Lea Vergine, assigned one entire room to each of the artists: in his, De Maria realised an immersive intervention, where flat fields of colour drowned the walls of his room in yellow, red, blue, orange, violet and green, and on which he installed the five large-scale canvases on view at Cortesi Gallery in Milan. The Teste Orfiche (as the artists titled them, numbering them from I to V) are each 3-metres in height and some measure over 5-metres in width. The works recall geometric shapes, natural landscapes, imagined starry skies and, at the same time, the visual suggestions of a musical score. With their chromatic ‘violence’, these pieces involve and encompass the viewer in an endless space of colour.
The works recall geometric shapes, natural landscapes, imagined starry skies and, at the same time, the visual suggestions of a musical score. With their chromatic ‘violence’, these pieces involve and encompass the viewer in an endless space of colour. They thrive on a peculiar light that comes from within, rather than form the outside, an effect achieved by De Maria through his use of natural pigments in a return to the primal techniques of painting. At the exhibition in Milan, these five large canvases will be displayed with smaller scale historical works, as they were at the 1990 Venice Biennale, and again at the re-showing of the display at the Centro per l'Arte Contemporanea Luigi Pecci in 2012. Cortesi Gallery was founded in 2013 in Lugano by collector and art dealer Stefano Cortesi, and sees his two sons, Andrea and Lorenzo, working closely with him. Cortesi Gallery specialises in European artistic movements from the 60s to the present day, and its activity is characterised by a conscious effort to produce relevant displays with the collaboration of specialists in the field, such as external curators, researchers, artists’ archives and foundations. The first space opened to the public with the exhibition, Italian Art 60s–90s (2013). In May 2015, Cortesi Gallery expanded, opening a space in London’s Mayfair with a group show dedicated to the ZERO group, titled ATMOSFERA ZERO - Great Expectations #2. Exhibitions from 2013 to 2016 reflected the gallery’s expertise with major presentations featuring the ZERO group, New Tendencies, Optical, Kinetic, Conceptual and Minimal Art.
In 2014, Cortesi Gallery invited Eva Fabbris, independent curator and researcher at Fondazione Prada, to curate an exhibition in the Lugano space that juxtaposed the oeuvre of Paolo Scheggi with the contemporary practice of Lucy Skaer. In 2015, Cortesi Gallery hosted the exhibitions Great Expectations #1, Grazia Varisco. Filo Rosso, and Grazia Varisco. If…. In 2016, the London programme continued with Agostino Bonalumi. I Wish to Meet Architects, followed by a retrospective of the Croatian artist Ivan Picelj and New Tendencies. In 2016, the space in Lugano hosted the exhibition, Heinz Mack. The Visible Reminder of Invisible Light, Gianfranco Pardi. Works 1968-82, Architetture, Poeticamente and Maurizio Donzelli. La linea del tutto. In 2017, the London gallery presented the solo show Gianfranco Pardi. Works 1968–1988, while the exhibition Louise Nevelson. Assemblages and Collages 1960-1980, dedicated to the great American sculptor, took place in in Lugano. A solo show of Walter Leblanc, curated by Francesca Pola, will open in June at the London gallery. Nicola De Maria (Foglianise, 1954) lives and works in Turin. As medical student, he was initially interested in experimental photography. From 1975, he turned to drawing and subsequently to painting. He soon became one of the leading exponents of the Transavanguardia – an artistic movement defined by art critic and historian Achille Bonito Oliva in 1978 - despite the fact that in the 80s he distanced himself from the others by creating a body of non-figurative works loaded with lyrical, fabled and spiritual references. During the 90s, he focused on the purest form of abstraction: his pictorial language combined suggestive images, metamorphic and abstract, with words traced in a delicate handwriting, and leaving to the impasto, the evocation of poetical and musical emotions.
De Maria also exceeds the limits of the canvas by pervading the exhibition space. Although a follower of the New York school of abstraction, he nevertheless employs colour techniques that belong to the ancient Italian masters – who used them to paint in churches – thus remaining faithful to the modern tradition. He took part in the International Art Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia three times (1980, 1988, 1990), and exhibited at Documenta 7 in Kassel (1982), at the XVI São Paulo Art Biennial (1981), at the IV Sydney Biennial (1982) and at the Quadriennale di Roma (2005, 2012), amongst others. His work has been subject of several retrospectives in major international museums, including the Kunsthalle Basel (1983), Kunsthaus Zürich (1985), the Van Abbemuseum in Eindhoven (1985), the Seibu Museum of Modern Art in Tokyo (1988), Museo d'Arte Contemporanea di Roma (MACRO, 2004), Centro per l’Arte Contemporanea Luigi Pecci in Prato (2011)and Galleria Civica d’Arte Moderna e Contemporanea (GAM) in Turin (2013). His work has also been included in surveys of Transavanguardia held at Castello di Rivol in Turin (2003) and Palazzo Reale in Milan (2012). Cortesi Gallery was founded in 2013 in Lugano by collector and art dealer Stefano Cortesi, and sees his two sons, Andrea and Lorenzo, working closely with him. Cortesi Gallery specialises in European artistic movements from the 60s to the present day, and its activity is characterised by a conscious effort to produce relevant displays with the collaboration of specialists in the field, such as external curators, researchers, artists’ archives and foundations. The first space opened to the public with the exhibition, Italian Art 60s–90s (2013).
In May 2015, Cortesi Gallery expanded, opening a space in London’s Mayfair with a group show dedicated to the ZERO group, titled ATMOSFERA ZERO - Great Expectations #2. Exhibitions from 2013 to 2016 reflected the gallery’s expertise with major presentations featuring the ZERO group, New Tendencies, Optical, Kinetic, Conceptual and Minimal Art. In 2014, Cortesi Gallery invited Eva Fabbris, independent curator and researcher at Fondazione Prada, to curate an exhibition in the Lugano space that juxtaposed the oeuvre of Paolo Scheggi with the contemporary practice of Lucy Skaer. In 2015, Cortesi Gallery hosted the exhibitions Great Expectations #1, Grazia Varisco. Filo Rosso, and Grazia Varisco. If…. In 2016, the London programme continued with Agostino Bonalumi. I Wish to Meet Architects, followed a retrospective of the Croatian artist Ivan Picelj and New Tendencies. In 2016, the space in Lugano hosted the exhibition, Heinz Mack. The Visible Reminder of Invisible Light, Gianfranco Pardi. Works 1968-82, Architetture, Poeticamente and Maurizio Donzelli. La linea del tutto. In 2017, the London gallery presented the solo show Gianfranco Pardi. Works 1968–1988, while the exhibition Louise Nevelson. Assemblages and Collages 1960-1980, dedicated to the great American sculptor, took place in in Lugano. A solo show of Walter Leblanc, curated by Francesca Pola, will open in June at the London gallery.
1. Nicola De Maria, Testa Orfica I, 1990, pigments and resin oncanvas, 300x565 cm 2. Nicola De Maria, Testa Orfica II, 1990, pigments and resin oncanvas, 300x400 cm 3. Nicola De Maria, Testa Orfica III, 1990, pigments and resin oncanvas, 300x545 4. Nicola De Maria, Testa Orfica IV, 1990, pigments and resin oncanvas, 300x400 cm 5. Nicola De Maria, Testa Orfica V, 1990, pigments and resin oncanvas, 300x565 cm 6. Installation view, Nicola De Maria. I miei dipinti s’inchinano a Dio, curated by Marco Bazzini and Achille Bonito Oliva, Prato, Centro per l’Arte Contemporanea Luigi Pecci, 2012 7. Installation view, Nicola De Maria’s personal room at the 44 th Venice Biennale, Italian Pavillon, 1990.
Installation view, “Nicola De Maria. From the Venice Biennale 1990”, Cortesi Gallery, Milano, photo by Lorenzo Croce, courtesy Cortesi Gallery London – Milano – Lugano
Nicola De Maria (b. 1954, Foglianise, Italy)
Testa Orfica I, 1990 pigments and resin on canvas 300×565cm
Bibliography: "Nicola De Maria. I miei dipinti si inchinano a Dio", curated by A. Bonito Oliva and M. Bazzini, catalogue of the exhibition (Prato, Centro per L'arte Contemporanea Luigi Pecci, 10/12/2011-4/03/2012), Milan, Prearo Editore, 2012, pp. 210-211 (ripr.), p. 301. Exhibitions: 1990, Personal room at the 44th Venice Biennial in the Italian Pavilion. 2011-2012 “Nicola de Maria. I miei dipinti s’inchinano a Dio”, curated by A. Bonito Oliva and M. Bazzini, Prato, Centro per L’Arte Contemporanea Luigi Pecci. Provenance: Private Collection, Italy.
Nicola De Maria (b. 1954, Foglianise, Italy)
Testa Orfica II, 1990 pigments and resin on canvas 300×400cm Bibliography: "Nicola De Maria. I miei dipinti si inchinano a Dio", curated by A. Bonito Oliva and M. Bazzini, catalogue of the exhibition (Prato, Centro per L'arte Contemporanea Luigi Pecci, 10/12/2011-4/03/2012), Milan, Prearo Editore, 2012, pp. 214-215 (ripr.), p. 301. Exhibitions: 1990, Personal room at the 44th Venice Biennial in the Italian Pavilion. 2011-2012 “Nicola de Maria. I miei dipinti s’inchinano a Dio”, curated by A. Bonito Oliva and M. Bazzini, Prato, Centro per L’Arte Contemporanea Luigi Pecci. Provenance: Private Collection, Italy.
Nicola De Maria (b. 1954, Foglianise, Italy)
Testa Orfica III, 1990 pigments and resin on canvas 300×565cm Bibliography: "Nicola De Maria. I miei dipinti si inchinano a Dio", curated by A. Bonito Oliva and M. Bazzini, catalogue of the exhibition (Prato, Centro per L'arte Contemporanea Luigi Pecci, 10/12/2011-4/03/2012), Milan, Prearo Editore, 2012, pp. 216-217 (ripr.), p. 301. Exhibitions: 1990, Personal room at the 44th Venice Biennal in the Italian Pavilion. 2011-2012 “Nicola de Maria. I miei dipinti s’inchinano a Dio”, curated by A. Bonito Oliva and M. Bazzini, Prato, Centro per L’Arte Contemporanea Luigi Pecci. Provenance: Private Collection, Italy.
Nicola De Maria (b. 1954, Foglianise, Italy) Testa Orfica IV, 1990 pigments and resin on canvas 300×400cm Bibliography: "Nicola De Maria. I miei dipinti si inchinano a Dio", curated by A. Bonito Oliva and M. Bazzini, catalogue of the exhibition (Prato, Centro per L'arte Contemporanea Luigi Pecci, 10/12/2011-4/03/2012), Milan, Prearo Editore, 2012, pp. 218-219 (ripr.), p. 301. Exhibitions: 1990, Personal room at the 44th Venice Biennal in the Italian Pavilion. 2011-2012 “Nicola de Maria. I miei dipinti s’inchinano a Dio”, curated by A. Bonito Oliva and M. Bazzini, Prato, Centro per L’Arte Contemporanea Luigi Pecci. Provenance: Private Collection, Italy.
Nicola De Maria (b. 1954, Foglianise, Italy)
Testa Orfica V, 1990 pigments and resin on canvas 300×565cm
Bibliography: "Nicola De Maria. I miei dipinti si inchinano a Dio", curated by A. Bonito Oliva and M. Bazzini, catalogue of the exhibition (Prato, Centro per L'arte Contemporanea Luigi Pecci, 10/12/2011-4/03/2012), Milan, Prearo Editore, 2012, pp. 212-213 (ripr.), p. 301. Exhibitions: 1990, Personal room at the 44th Venice Biennal in the Italian Pavilion. 2011-2012 “Nicola de Maria. I miei dipinti s’inchinano a Dio”, curated by A. Bonito Oliva and M. Bazzini, Prato, Centro per L’Arte Contemporanea Luigi Pecci. Provenance: Private Collection, Italy.
Bibliografia
- "Nicola De Maria. I miei dipinti si inchinano a Dio", curated by A. Bonito Oliva and M. Bazzini, catalogue of the exhibition (Prato, Centro per L'arte Contemporanea Luigi Pecci, 10/12/20114/03/2012), Milan, Prearo Editore, 2012
- "Nicola De Maria. Elegia Cosmica", curated by A. Bonito Oliva and D. Eccher, catalogue of the exhibition (Roma, Museo d’Arte Contemporanea, 31/1/2014-9/05/2014), Milan, Macro, Electa, 2004
- ”Transavanguardia”, curated by I. Giannelli, catalogue of the exhibition (Torino, Castello di Rivoli, Museo d’Arte Contemporanea, 13/16/2002-23/08/2002), Milan, Skira, 2002
LONDON 41 & 43 Maddox St., W1S 2PD – UK +44 20 74 93 6009 MILANO Corso di Porta Nuova 46/B, 20121 – IT +39 02 36756539 LUGANO Via Frasca 5, 6900 – CH +41 91 92 14 000