Identikit, 1987-03
GPO-0883
Wooden photo frame, collage on paper, red ink on glass, crumpled sheets of drawing paper
49 x 39 x 45 cm
Private collection, Biella
A dark wooden portrait holder frames, sketched upon the glass in red ink, the outline of the artist’s hand, which seems to be attempting to hold down a composite ensemble of paper elements. The torn and crumpled details applied to the passepartout are from a portrait of Paolini taken by Paolo Mussat Sartor in 1971, while the elements packed in between the portrait holder and its stand derive from sheets of drawing paper (two more fragments are applied in the lower corners of the portrait holder).
If in the previous variants of Identikit, made between 1987 and 1989 (GPO-0589, GPO-0616, GPO-0622, GPO-0642), the mysterious portrait was only implicitly a self-portrait (via metaphorical attributes of the author), in this case the clues are more explicit. Moreover, the author avoids making his face visible, as if he himself were in search of his own image, hidden between the traces of the past (the 1971 portrait) and the fragments of the sheets that are still blank.
Portrait of Giulio Paolini taken by Paolo Mussat Sartor, 1971.
| 2004 | Rome, Galleria dell'Oca, Giulio Paolini. Carte segrete, 6 November 2004 - 4 January 2005. |
| • | M. D'Alessandro, L. Laureati, “Giulio Paolini. Le cose, materia di disegno”, in disegno industriale 13 (Rome), 2005, col. repr. p. 104 (exhibition view Rome 2004). |
