Early Dynastic (IV), 1978

The fourth version of Early Dynastic – a cycle of five works begun in 1971 (cf. GPO-0228, GPO-0257, GPO-0324 [reproduced in travertine, GPO-0354], GPO-0713) – dates back to a commission for a work in situ in the New York apartment of Nicola Bulgari, remodeled by the architect Piero Sartogo in 1978. After a series of events, on the occasion of the donation of the work to the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis in 2018, the artist decided to reformulate the work in its entirety for the new context.
Originally, the work developed across four adjacent rooms and was strictly correlated with a floor design in stainless steel sections, based on an increase in orthogonal modules. In analogy with the mesh of the geometric pattern, the seven elements gradually grew in diameter, while in compliance with the basic criterion for the Early Dynastic cycle, they varied with regards to the number of overlapping components that were gradually halved in size. The first room hosted the four thinnest elements, consisting of four overlapping columns; made up of three columns; the third of one element made up of two columns; while the last one was characterized by a drawing on the floor that was limited to indicating the position of the hypothetical fourth element, made up of just one oversized column.
In the new version the seven columns are arranged on a PVC floor surface that is characterized by an orthogonal pattern of 9 x 5 units. On the rear wall is a projection in a loop of a series of images (in positive or in negative) of the original installation of the work. This new version joins past, present, and future seamlessly. The archival images fading in and out bear witness to the original configuration, just as the pattern on the floor recalls the original floor design, changed, however, into the register of a uniform chequerboard. The columns scattered about in the manner of an archaeological site have thus become pieces in a game arranged on square modules, according to a potentially limitless design. Among the clues of an irreversible past and the unpredictable variables of the future, the game is open: the columns that preserve the memory of their original context became the tiles in a constantly evolving mosaic.