Ercole e Lica, 1981
GPO-0444
Hercules and Lichas
White-painted wooden volume, fabric, plaster casts
Wooden volume 170 x 110 x 60 cm, overall dimensions variable
FRAC Grand Large – Hauts-de-France, Dunkerque
Acquired in 1983, inventory no. 83.58.1-11
Various plaster casts of body parts are strewn about on the ground and tied together by a long piece of red cloth, which emerges from a wooden parallelepiped, to then drop down to the floor.
Continuing the story recalled in a previous work, whose protagonists are Nessus, Hercules, and Lichas (cf. Nesso, 1977, GPO-0374), the work harkens back to the episode in which Hercules wears a tunic soaked in Nessus’ poisoned blood (which explains the use of the colour red). Aware of the deception, he becomes infuriated with his companion Lichas, throws him into the sky and turns him to stone. The concatenation between the two moments in the story is manifested in the size of the parallelepiped, which is big enough to contain Nessus’ mass.
| 1981 | Cologne, Galerie Paul Maenz, Giulio Paolini, 30 June - 1 August. |
| 1982 | Amsterdam, Stedelijk Museum, ’60-’80: Attitudes / concepts / images, 9 April - 11 July, cataloge with two volumes, main volume: repr. p. 186, volume with exhibition views: repr. p. 62. |
| 1983 | Lille, Musée des Beaux-Arts, Collections du FRAC Nord-Pas de Calais, June, no catalogue. |
| 1984 | Calais, Musée des Beaux-Arts, Collections du FRAC Nord-Pas de Calais, June-September, no catalogue. |
| 1985 | Rennes, Musée des Beaux-Arts, Sur/Exposition. Regards sur l’exposition d’art contemporain, 8 March - 12 May, entry by R. Breton and H. Crenn p. 24, repr. p. 25. |
| 1985-86 | Lille, Musée de l’Hospice Comtesse, Collections du FRAC Nord-Pas de Calais, November 1985 - January 1986, no catalogue. |
| 1986 | Lille, Opéra, Sculptures et Musique, December, no catalogue. |
| 1987 | Chambéry, Musée Savoisien, Turin 1965-1987. De l’Arte Povera dans les collections publiques françaises, 8 March - 11 May, touring to: Lille, Musée de l’Hospice Comtesse, 13 July - 30 August; La Roche-sur-Yon, Musée municipal, 22 September - 16 November, cat. no. 37 p. 78, repr.; exhibited only in Chambéry. |
| 1987 | Tours, Centre de création contemporaine, Arte Povera, 19 June - 6 September, no catalogue. |
| 1989 | Anzin, Château Dampierre, Références ou détournements, November-December, no catalogue. |
| 1995 | Brussels, Anciens Magasins Old England - Futur Musée des Instruments, Les Fragments du Désir. Collections en exposition: Œuvres du FRAC Nord-Pas de Calais, 2 June - 17 September, no catalogue. |
| 2000 | Liévin, Ecole La Fontaine, Allan McCollum, “Natural Copies from the Coal Mines of Central Utah”, 1995. Giulio Paolini, “Ercole e Lica”, 1981, 15 September - 17 November, no catalogue. |
| 2004 | Dunkerque, FRAC Nord-Pas de Calais, Interlude 1: Arte Povera. Variations pour la collection du FRAC Nord-Pas de Calais, 3 April - 31 July, no catalogue. |
| 2017 | Koksijde, Kunstencentrum Ten Bogaerde, Good Boy Bad Boy, 24 June - 24 September, no catalogue (?). |
| • | E. Franz, “Del bello intelligibile – Die geistige Schönheit”, in Giulio Paolini. Del bello intelligibile, exhibition catalogue, Bielefeld, Kunsthalle Bielefeld, 1982, p. 9, repr.; republished in Pratiques. Réflexions sur l’Art 2 (Rennes), Autumn, 1996, p. 43, repr. |
| • | FRAC Nord-Pas de Calais. Acquisitions 1983 (Dunkerque: 1983), loose entry with text by J. Coucke, repr. |
| • | M. Disch, Giulio Paolini. Catalogo ragionato 1960-1999, vol. 1 (Milan: Skira editore, 2008), cat. no. 444 p. 454, col. repr. |
