Più vero del vero, 1995-98
GPO-0806
Truer Than True
Black pencil, plexiglas case, primed canvas, pencil on wall
Plexiglas case 100 x 130 cm, canvas 50 x 65 cm, overall dimensions variable
Andrea and Rosalba Scardina Collection, Turin
Acquired in 2018
The extension of the drawing on the wall varies according to the dimensions of the latter. The minimum solution involves a pattern with at least one whole rectangle and one-half open rectangle (towards the outside) all around the canvas (minimum overall dimensions ca. 200 x 325 cm). All of the rectangles turned outwards are open (or incomplete), indicating the potential continuity of the drawing. In the area corresponding to the plexiglas case, the drawing of the rectangles is interrupted.
At the centre of a plexiglas case, with a primed canvas inside it, a black pencil grazes the canvas but without touching the surface, as if to withhold the instant that precedes contact. The case is included in a close-knit grid of rectangles drawn on the wall, of the same size as the canvas, arranged in parallel and incomplete rows at the edges to indicate the hypothetical extension of the drawing.
The title focuses on the gesture of the pencil pointed towards the canvas as a concrete and authentic expression – “truer than true” – of the possibility that an image can become visible on the canvas. In the artist’s own words: “Più vero del vero (Truer than true), that is, the ‘moment of truth’ constituted not so much by the lines that the pencil will manage to leave on the surface of the canvas, but by the fact itself that the pencil points straight to the purpose, to capture, that is, the pure eventuality that this will occur”.1
The same theme was formulated in two previous variants, made in 1995 (GPO-0755, GPO-0756).
1 G. Paolini in conversation with M. Disch (2005), in M. Disch, Giulio Paolini. Catalogo ragionato 1960-1999, vol. 2 (Milan: Skira editore, 2008), cat. no. 755 p. 768.
| 1998 | Graz, Neue Galerie im Landesmuseum Joanneum, Giulio Paolini. Von heute bis gestern / Da oggi a ieri, 4 April - 31 May, cited in the checklist of exhibited works no. 5 p. 180 (erroneously dated “1996”), not repr. |
| 1999 | Turin, GAM Galleria Civica d’Arte Moderna e Contemporanea, Giulio Paolini. Da oggi a ieri, 8 May - 25 July, cited in the checklist of exhibited works no. 7 p. 37 (erroneously dated “1996”), col. repr. p. 87 (exhibition view Graz 1998). |
| • | M. Disch, Giulio Paolini. Catalogo ragionato 1960-1999, vol. 2 (Milan: Skira editore, 2008), cat. no. 806 p. 827, col. repr. (exhibition view Graz 1998). |
| • | Giulio Paolini. A come Accademia, exhibition catalogue, Rome, Accademia Nazionale di San Luca (Rome: Gangemi Editore, 2023), col. repr. pp. 228-229 (exhibition view Graz 1998). |
