Doppia verità, 1995
GPO-0748
Double Truth
Plaster casts, plexiglas cases with reflecting side, white plinth
Two plexiglas cases 50 x 50 x 50 cm each, plinth 110 x 110 x 60 cm, overall dimensions 160 x 110 x 60 cm
Private collection, Milan
Two plexiglas cases placed close together on a plinth – the sides in contact mirror each other – hold the two half plaster casts of two antique heads, arranged close to the reflecting side. In the case to the left is the left half of a male classical head, while in the case to the right is the right half of the head of the Athena Lemnia.
Seen from the front the two casts generate an incongruous head, while from the side each half appears to be integrated by the double of itself in the mirror. In the chimerical game of vis-à-vis, each correspondence, however realistic, is illusory, since the "truth" is doubled and divided, generating a deceitful game of gazes that suspends the vision of an integral unit.
The same theme was also developed in four other variants, made between 1995 and 1996, with the casts of other heads, arranged according to variable opposites (GPO-0749, GPO-0750, GPO-0751, GPO-0772).
• Athena Lemnia, Roman copy of the 5th century BC bronze original by Phidias, marble, Museo Civico Archeologico, Bologna.
• Apollo Bust, 1st century AD Roman copy of an original from the Classical Age, white marble, Musei Reali – Museo di Antichità, Turin.
| 1995 | Rome, Galleria Gian Enzo Sperone, Giulio Paolini, from 6 April. |
| • | Giulio Paolini. La voce del pittore – Scritti e interviste 1965-1995, edited by M. Disch (Lugano: ADV Publishing House, 1995), repr. nos. 1, 5 (details). |
| • | Artmonie. Architettura e scultura negli spazi pubblici, exhibition catalogue, Ivano Fracena, Castel Ivano, 1997, col. repr. p. 112. |
| • | Artecittà. 11 Artisti per il Passante Ferroviario di Torino, exhibition catalogue, Turin, Galleria Civica d’Arte Moderna e Contemporanea (Turin: Hopefulmonster editore, 1998), col. repr. p. 46 (detail). |
| • | Giulio Paolini. Von heute bis gestern / Da oggi a ieri, exhibition catalogue, Graz, Neue Galerie im Landesmuseum Joanneum (Ostfildern-Ruit: Cantz Verlag, 1998), col. repr. 319 (detail). |
| • | T. Wada, “Giulio Paolini. Artist Interview 1”, in BT Bijutsu Techo 50, no. 755 (Tokyo), May, 1998, col. repr. p. 200. |
| • | M. Unterdörfer, Die Rezeption der Antike in der Postmoderne: der Gipsabguss in der italienischen Kunst der siebziger und achtziger Jahre (Weimar: VDG Verlag und Datenbank für Geisteswissenschaften, 1998), pp. 41-42, 166, 169, cat. no. 65 p. 147, repr. no. 40 p. 226. |
| • | M. Bandini, “Arte che parla dell’arte”, in Ars 8 (Milan), August, 1999, col. repr. p. 99. |
| • | Gian Enzo Sperone. Torino Roma New York 35 anni di mostre tra Europa e America, vol. 2 (Turin: Hopefulmonster editore, 2000), p. 447, col. repr. |
| • | F. Hartog, Memoria di Ulisse. Racconti sulla frontiera nell’antica Grecia (Turin: Giulio Einaudi editore, 2002), col. repr. on cover. |
| • | G. Lista, Arte Povera (Milan: 5 Continents Editions, 2006), p. 50, col. repr. no. 44. |
| • | Risonanze #2. Giulio Paolini & Fabio Vacchi, exhibition catalogue, Rome, Spazio Risonanze, Auditorium Parco della Musica (Cinisello Balsamo: Silvana Editoriale, 2008), repr. p. 56. |
| • | M. Disch, Giulio Paolini. Catalogo ragionato 1960-1999, vol. 2 (Milan: Skira editore, 2008), cat. no. 748 p. 762, col. repr. |
| • | D. Liberanome, “In crescita le sculture di Paolini”, in Art e Dossier 284 (Florence), January, 2012, p. 78, col. repr. p. 79. |
