Works from the Collection of Rosetta Barabino
Emotional Order
An exhibition curated by Francesco Bonami 15–24 & 29–31 March
18. Cy Twombly (detail)
14. Bruce Nauman (detail)
Works from the Collection of Rosetta Barabino
Emotional Order
An exhibition curated by Francesco Bonami 15–24 & 29–31 March
Exhibition Dates & Location 15 – 31 March 2016 (25 – 28 closed for Easter holidays) 30 Berkeley Square, London W1J 6EX Viewing Monday – Saturday 10am–6pm Sunday 12pm–6pm
Contemporary Art Department Curator Francesco Bonami fbonami@phillips.com Specialist Carolina Lanfranchi clanfranchi@phillips.com
Exhibitions Department Head of International Exhibitions Britanny Lopez Slater +1 212 940 1299 bslater@phillips.com Exhibitions Manager Edwin Pennicott +44 20 7901 2909 epennicott@phillips.com
Cataloguer Margherita Solaini msolaini@phillips.com
Introduction by Francesco Bonami
Francesco Bonami Senior Advisor to the Chairman and CEO
Rosetta Barabino was a kind of collector that today would be considered a protected species under the shield of the WWF. She belonged to that breed of collectors who look at art as the ultimate effort for a human being to cope with the mystery of life. Hence, art was for Madame Barabino, an exclusive intimate private matter to be shared with her three children. In turn, this defined her collecting method, collecting when possible three works of each artist. In this way, the collection was founded in the numbers, one and three, like the catholic Trinity at the same time. Madame Barabino was a very orderly collector who was pushed in her choices by, mostly but not only, by one of her sons, Maurizio – who was rather following his emotions that his mother’s rationality. Most of the works have been acquired to live with them. Art was for Rosetta Barabino part of her and her children’s’ life. It was not a life apart or an accumulation of trophies, even if in the long run a majority of the works in her collection will turn into trophies. She was not a clairvoyant but clearly her mind was checking and balancing her emotions. So the art she bought was not simply the result of an aesthetic passion but the ultimate decision coming out of dialogues and conversation about the art, looking both at the content than the qualities of the works. Rosetta Barabino collected art when art was mostly for the art sake. There were no global issues to look after or political ones. Art was the product of ideas turned into objects. Art was about a western centered world navel gazing and in social and cultural motion. That’s why Joseph Beuys’ work sticks out as committed and politically coherent odd ball in the midst of a group of artists mostly American, mostly self-centered while utterly rigorous. Emotional Order is about a group of works by artists who like the lady who collected them shared the need to give a structure to their feelings and emotional condition. Looking at seminal works by Carl Andre or Donald Judd we cannot dismiss the fact that while condensed into a minimal form
they were able to retain the richness of their struggle between order and disorder. Bruce Nauman plays the same struggle but adding a more playful attitude where language adds another layer to the story. As a collector, Rosetta Barabino was able to navigate the complexity of those ideas and picking them as someone picks somebody else’s brain. Her brain was also her home and her home was her brain. Emotional Order is just the tip of the iceberg of a collection that goes both deep and further on. Where Danh Vo’s flag is just a token representing a passion verging into addiction that Rosetta Barabino passed like in a relay-race to her sons. In today’s art world of extremes where it’s hard to define clearly the line of demarcation between passion and speculation, this glimpse in Barabino’s world is a luxury; like witnessing a kind of collecting utopian arcadia that it’s hard to believe really existed. Looking at the way they were (the collectors), I would like to conclude with an amusing anecdote told to me by Swiss artists Peter Fischli and David Weiss few years ago. Asked in the early 80’s to do a show at Ileana Sonnabend in New York, one of the most prestigious galleries around at that time the poor two young artists worked relentlessly to do their best with their best work for their American debut. Being Swiss they were very precise. So they keep calling the gallery to know the exact measures of the gallery’s doors. Until a day when Ileana Sonnabend, in person, came to the phone to understand what was the issue. Once she heard the artists’ request she calmly replied, ‘Guys is not important how big is the door of my gallery but how big is the one of the collector.’ I am sure she had in mind the doors of the special breed of collectors to whom Rosetta Barabino belonged. A breed, who once they fall in love with an artwork, they want to sleep with it, and not simply hidden away in a climatized storage or viewing room, but rather in the coziness of their homes beds.
1. Carl Andre 100 Magnesium square, 1970 100 magnesium plates 200 x 200 x 0.8 cm (cm 20 x 20 x 0.8 each)
2. Joseph Beuys Herdlampe – himmelslampe, 1953 Wood, zinc, burnished bronze 160 x 18 x 20 cm
3. Dan Flavin Monument 12 for V.Tatlin, 1964 Daylight fluorescent light, light tubes 220 x 62 x 10.5 cm
4. Dan Flavin Untitled (to Henri Matisse), 1969 Pink, yellow, blue and green fluorescent light 120 x 40 x 10.5 cm
5. Gilbert & George Bloody life # 2, 1975 Photo print on paper 246 x 206 cm, 50 x 60 cm each
6. Donald Judd Untitled (round progression long), 1969 Brass 12.7 x 175.3 x 21.6 cm
7. On Kawara Thursday, July 5, 1973, today series n.46, 1973 Liquitex acrylic su tela, handmade cardboard box, newspaper 33 x 25.5 cm
8. Joseph Kosuth ‘One and three chairs’, 1965 straw chair, mounted photographic enlargement of a chair, mounted photographic enlargement of the dictionary definition of “chair” Various dimensions
9. Joseph Kosuth ‘One and Eight-A Description’, 1965 Violet neon mounted directly on the wall 8 x 320 cm
10. Gordon Matta-Clark Infraform, 1973 Three parts: two parts, each black-and-white photograph;each 21.9 x 28.5 cm; one part, three black-and white photographs 28.5 x 62.5 cm; overall cm. 28.5 x 119.7
11. Allan McCollum 40 Plaster Surrogates, 1982/89 Enamel on Hydrocal, signed, dated and numbered consecutively on the reverse of each of 40 parts Various dimensions
12. Robert Morris Fountain, 1971 Seven stripes of black felt 189 x 360 cm 0.8 x 27.5 x 570 cm each
13. Bruce Nauman None sing/neon sign, 1971 Fluorescent tubes 70 x 45 cm
14. Bruce Nauman “Henry Moore bound to fail”, 1967-1970 Cast iron 64.8 x 61 x 6.4 cm
15. Mario Schifano Botticelli n. 2, 1962 Enamel and paper on canvas 140 x 132 cm
16. Haim Steinbach No wires, no power cord, #3, 1986 5 wood trays, 2 pairs of sneakers, wood 76 x 119 x 47 cm
17. Oscar Tuazon Untitled, (Papercrete), 2009 Concrete, newspapers and oak panels 42 x 42 x 5 cm
18. Cy Twombly Untitled, 1961 Mixed media on canvas 98 x 143 cm
19. Danh Vo Helix Box, 2010 Gold leaf on cardboard 47.5 x 82.3 cm
20. Andy Warhol Silver Car Crash, 1963 silkscreen and synthetic polymer on canvas 205.5 x 81 cm
21. Andy Warhol Chairman Mao (Fuchsia), 1973 Silkscreen on canvas and acrylic paint 25.3 x 30.1 cm
List of works
Exhibition Dates & Location 15 – 31 March 2016 (25 – 28 closed for Easter holidays) 30 Berkeley Square, London W1J 6EX
Viewing Monday – Saturday 10am–6pm Sunday 12pm–6pm
1. Carl Andre
8. Joseph Kosuth ‘One and three chairs’, 1965 straw chair, mounted photographic enlargement of a chair, mounted photographic enlargement of the dictionary definition of “chair” Various dimensions
15. Mario Schifano Botticelli n. 2, 1962 Enamel and paper on canvas 140 x 132 cm
16. Haim Steinbach No wires, no power cord, #3, 1986 5 wood trays, 2 pairs of sneakers, wood 76 x 119 x 47 cm
17. Oscar Tuazon Untitled, (Papercrete), 2009 Concrete, newspapers and oak panels 42 x 42 x 5 cm
18. Cy Twombly Untitled, 1961 Mixed media on canvas 98 x 143 cm
19. Danh Vo Helix Box, 2010 Gold leaf on cardboard 47.5 x 82.3 cm
20. Andy Warhol Silver Car Crash, 1963 silkscreen and synthetic polymer on canvas 205.5 x 81 cm
10. Gordon Matta-Clark Infraform, 1973 Three parts: two parts, each blackand-white photograph;each 21.9 x 28.5 cm; one part, three black-and white photographs 28.5 x 62.5 cm; overall cm. 28.5 x 119.7
14. Bruce Nauman “Henry Moore bound to fail”, 1967-1970 Cast iron 64.8 x 61 x 6.4 cm
9. Joseph Kosuth ‘One and Eight-A Description’, 1965 Neon electrical lights in glass, transformers, cables 8 x 320 cm
7. On Kawara Thursday, July 5, 1973, today series n.46, 1973 Liquitex acrylic su tela, handmade cardboard box, newspaper 33 x 25.5 cm
13. Bruce Nauman None sing/neon sign, 1971 Fluorescent tubes 70 x 45 cm
6. Donald Judd Untitled (round progression long), 1969 Brass 12.7 x 175.3 x 21.6 cm
5. Gilbert & George Bloody life # 2, 1975 Photo print on paper 246 x 206 cm, 50 x 60 cm each
12. Robert Morris Fountain, 1971 Seven stripes of black felt 189 x 360 cm (0.8 x 27.5 x 570 cm each)
4. Dan Flavin Untitled (to Henri Matisse), 1969 Pink, yellow, blue and green fluorescent light 120 x 40 x 10.5 cm
3. Dan Flavin Monument 12 for V.Tatlin, 1964 Daylight fluorescent light, light tubes 220 x 62 x 10.5 cm
11. Allan McCollum 40 Plaster Surrogates, 1982/89 Enamel on Hydrocal, signed, dated and numbered consecutively on the reverse of each of 40 parts Various dimensions
2. Joseph Beuys Herdlampe – himmelslampe, 1953 Wood, zinc, burnished bronze 160 x 18 x 20 cm
Cover Bruce Nauman, None sing /neon sign, 1971 (detail) 2–3pp Cy Twombly, Untitled, 1961 (detail) Title page Bruce Nauman, “Henry Moore bound to fail”, 1967-1970 (detail) Following Andy Warhol, Silver Car Crash, 1963 (detail)
100 Magnesium square, 1970 100 magnesium plates 200 x 200 x 0.8 cm (cm 20 x 20 x 0.8 each)
21. Andy Warhol Chairman Mao (Fuchsia), 1973 Silkscreen on canvas and acrylic paint 25.3 x 30.1 cm
20. Andy Warhol (detail)
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