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Meridiana, 1994

Archive number

GPO-0739

English title

Sundial

Technique

Engraving on plaster, bronze

Dimensions

210 x 250 cm

Collection

Property of the City of San Gimignano

Acquisitions and loans

Acquired in 1994

Description

The drawing carved in the white-painted quadrant combines two concentric motifs: a hand intent on using the tip of a pencil to mark the centre of a wristwatch on a second hand, and an orbital pattern of circles and ellipses tangential to each other originating from the circle of the watch. A bronze slightly tilted pencil is fastened to the tip of the drawn pencil. The bronze pencil marks the start of the two drawings and at the same time it serves as a gnomon. Arranged in circle around the astral motif are the words “Tout se tient” (Everything holds together), so that they begin and end with the letter “T” and involve within their orbit the four cardinal points, i.e. “O” (west), “S” (south), “E” (east), “N” (north). The French expression was first used by the linguist Ferdinand de Saussure to designate a whole in which all the parts are coherent and interrelated: in this sense it refers to the celestial iconography – evoked in the orbital drawing – which represents par excellence the model of perfection in which all is fulfilled.
The permanent work on the facade of the Church of Sant’Agostino in San Gimignano, commissioned from the artist on the occasion of the group exhibition "Affinità. Cinque artisti a San Gimignano", is located in the site of an actual and older sun-dial, which has since been lost.
The same theme was also formulated in a variant made during the same year on the ground, conceived for the open patio of an architectural complex in Tokyo (GPO-0733).

Exhibitions

1994	San Gimignano, Affinità. Cinque artisti a San Gimignano, July, repr. pp. 42-44.

Artist’ writings

•	G. Paolini in Affinità. Cinque artisti a San Gimignano, exhibition catalogue, San Gimignano (Florence: Studio per Edizioni Scelte, 1994), p. 18.

Bibliography

•	M. Disch, “Giulio Paolini. Hors-d’oeuvre”, in Giulio Paolini. La voce del pittore – Scritti e interviste 1965-1995, edited by Id. (Lugano: ADV Publishing House, 1995), p. 105, repr. no. 23.
•	A. Coulange, Giulio Paolini. Carnets de la commande publique (Paris: Éditions du Regard, 1997), p. 61, repr. p. 60.
•	A. Zevi, Peripezie del dopoguerra nell’arte italiana (Turin: Giulio Einaudi editore, 2005), p. 546, not repr.
•	M. Disch, Giulio Paolini. Catalogo ragionato 1960-1999, vol. 2 (Milan: Skira editore, 2008), cat. no. 739 p. 753, repr.