Enfin seuls, 1980
GPO-0421
Pencil on wall
Dismantled work
The two specular figures in ceremonial dress reproduced at the left and right ends of a wall make up the vertices of the lines of sight, outlined in red pencil, embracing the entire wall, while at the centre a second drawing repeats the scene, but without the drawing of the lines of sight.
“Enfin seuls deals with a recurring theme in my work (already announced in Giovane che guarda Lorenzo Lotto [GPO-0140], via Vedo [GPO-0188], Chimera [GPO-0314], Mimesi [GPO-0283] and all the way to De pictura [GPO-0417]), where the gaze does not capture a full-fledged object of vision, but, rather, illustrates the enigma of its own course. In other words, 'seeing' is in turn seen as the subject and the object of the representation".1
The French expression in the title (“alone, finally”) alludes to the geometry of the gazes freed from any interferences and suspended in the void of a pure abstraction.
The same theme was reformulated the following year in a version on canvas (GPO-0441).
1 G. Paolini, Giulio Paolini, vol. Images/Index (Villeurbanne: Le Nouveau Musée, 1984), p. 102.
Figure from Antonio Sandre, Il costume nei tempi (Turin: Scuola Taglio Moderno, 1961), p. 268, fig. 299 (”Da ‘Minister’s Gazette of fashions’, 1925-30”), with the transformation of the original jacket into a tailcoat.
| 1980 | Bern, Kunsthalle Bern, Fabro, Kounellis, Merz, Paolini. Materialien zu einer Ausstellung, 29 February - 7 April, not repr. |
| 1980 | Amsterdam, Stedelijk Museum, Giulio Paolini, 10 April - 26 May, touring to: Oxford, The Museum of Modern Art, 8 June - 20 July, not repr. (reproduction of Studio per “Enfin seuls” p. 63). |
| • | G. Paolini in Giulio Paolini, vol. Images/Index (Villeurbanne: Le Nouveau Musée, 1984), p. 102. |
| • | M. Wechsler, in Giulio Paolini. Werke und Schriften 1960-1980 (Lucerne: Kunstmuseum Luzern, 1981), n. pag., not repr. |
| • | Giulio Paolini, vol. Images/Index (Villeurbanne: Le Nouveau Musée, 1984), repr. p. 103 (exhibition view Bern 1980). |
| • | C. Spadoni, "Giulio Paolini", in Figure. Teoria e critica dell’arte 3, no. 7 (Rome), 1984, p. 96, not repr. (Francis Picabia); republished in Id., Storie d’arte e di critica tra Ottocento e Novecento (Imola: Maretti Editore, 2021), p. 252, not. repr. |
| • | S. Vertone, “Non tutto qui”, in Giulio Paolini. “Tutto qui”, exhibition catalogue, Ravenna, Pinacoteca Comunale, Loggetta Lombardesca (Ravenna: Agenzia Editoriale Essegi, 1985), p. 40, not repr. |
| • | F. Poli, “Note di lettura”, in Id., Giulio Paolini (Turin: Lindau, 1990), p. 30, not repr.; republished in Giulio Paolini. Von heute bis gestern / Da oggi a ieri, exhibition catalogue, Graz, Neue Galerie im Landesmuseum Joanneum (Ostfildern-Ruit: Cantz Verlag, 1998), p. 49, not repr. |
| • | M. Disch, Giulio Paolini. Catalogo ragionato 1960-1999, vol. 1 (Milan: Skira editore, 2008), cat. no. 421 p. 430, repr. (exhibition view Amsterdam 1980). |
