Piero Manzoni di Chiosca e Poggiolo, better known as Piero Manzoni (July 13, 1933 – February 6, 1963) was an Italian artist best known for his ironic approach to avant-garde art. Often compared to the work of
Yves Klein
Yves Klein (; 28 April 1928 – 6 June 1962) was a French artist and an important figure in post-war European art. He was a leading member of the French artistic movement of Nouveau réalisme founded in 1960 by art critic Pierre Restany. Klein w ...
, his own work anticipated, and directly influenced, the work of a generation of younger Italian artists brought together by the critic
Germano Celant
Germano Celant (11 September 1940 – 29 April 2020) was an Italian art historian, critic and curator who coined the term " Arte Povera" (poor art) in 1967 and wrote many articles and books on the subject.
Work
Germano Celant was born in Genoa ...
Genoa
Genoa ( ; it, Genova ; lij, Zêna ). is the capital of the Italian region of Liguria and the List of cities in Italy, sixth-largest city in Italy. In 2015, 594,733 people lived within the city's administrative limits. As of the 2011 Italian ce ...
, 1967. Manzoni is most famous for a series of artworks that call into question the nature of the art object, directly prefiguring
Conceptual Art
Conceptual art, also referred to as conceptualism, is art in which the concept(s) or idea(s) involved in the work take precedence over traditional aesthetic, technical, and material concerns. Some works of conceptual art, sometimes called insta ...
.Grove Art Online, Piero Manzoni, essay by Laural Weintraub, His work eschews normal artist's materials, instead using everything from rabbit fur to
human excrement
Human feces (or faeces in British English) is the solid or semisolid remains of food that could not be digested or absorbed in the small intestine of humans, but has been further broken down by bacteria in the large intestine. It also contains b ...
in order to "tap mythological sources and to realize authentic and universal values".
His work is widely seen as a critique of the mass production and consumerism that was changing Italian society (the
Italian economic miracle
The Italian economic miracle or Italian economic boom ( it, il miracolo economico italiano) is the term used by historians, economists, and the mass media to designate the prolonged period of strong economic growth in Italy after the Second Worl ...
) after
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
. Italian artists such as Manzoni had to negotiate the new economic and material order of post-war Europe through inventive artistic practices which crossed geographic, artistic, and cultural borders.
Manzoni died of
myocardial infarction
A myocardial infarction (MI), commonly known as a heart attack, occurs when blood flow decreases or stops to the coronary artery of the heart, causing damage to the heart muscle. The most common symptom is chest pain or discomfort which may ...
in his studio in Milan on February 6, 1963. His contemporary
Ben Vautier
Ben Vautier, also known simply as Ben (born 18 July 1935 in Naples, Italy), is a French artist. Vautier lives and works in Nice, where he ran a record shop called ''Magazin'' between 1958 and 1973.
Biography
Benjamin Vautier was born on 18 Ju ...
signed Manzoni's death certificate, declaring it a work of art.
province of Cremona
The Province of Cremona ( it, provincia di Cremona; Cremunés: ; Cremasco: ; Casalasco-Viadanese: ) is a province in the Lombardy region of Italy. Its capital city is Cremona.
The province occupies the central section of Padana Plain, so the ...
. His full name was
Count
Count (feminine: countess) is a historical title of nobility in certain European countries, varying in relative status, generally of middling rank in the hierarchy of nobility. Pine, L. G. ''Titles: How the King Became His Majesty''. New York: ...
Meroni Manzoni di Chiosca e Poggiolo.
Self-taught as an artist, Manzoni first exhibited at the
Soncino's Castle
Soncino Castle (Italian: ''Rocca di Soncino'') is a military fortress in Soncino, northern Italy. It was built in the 10th century, and it was active since the years around 1500.
History
A set of walls around a defensive structure were built ...
in Soncino in August 1956, at the age of 23. His early work was broadly gestural, and showed the influence of Milanese proponents of Nuclear Art, such as
Enrico Baj
Enrico Baj (October 31, 1924 – June 15, 2003)June 15 according to the Guardian, June 17 according to the-artists.org was an Italian artist and writer on art. Many of his works show an obsession with nuclear war. He created prints, sculptur ...
. His later works, from approximately 1957 until his death in 1963, questioned and satirized the status of the art object as it had been conceived throughout
modernism
Modernism is both a philosophy, philosophical and arts movement that arose from broad transformations in Western world, Western society during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The movement reflected a desire for the creation of new fo ...
. Influences include earlier (though still active) artists like
Marcel Duchamp
Henri-Robert-Marcel Duchamp (, , ; 28 July 1887 – 2 October 1968) was a French painter, sculptor, chess player, and writer whose work is associated with Cubism, Dada, and conceptual art. Duchamp is commonly regarded, along with Pablo Picasso ...
and contemporaneous practitioners
Ben Vautier
Ben Vautier, also known simply as Ben (born 18 July 1935 in Naples, Italy), is a French artist. Vautier lives and works in Nice, where he ran a record shop called ''Magazin'' between 1958 and 1973.
Biography
Benjamin Vautier was born on 18 Ju ...
and
Yves Klein
Yves Klein (; 28 April 1928 – 6 June 1962) was a French artist and an important figure in post-war European art. He was a leading member of the French artistic movement of Nouveau réalisme founded in 1960 by art critic Pierre Restany. Klein w ...
.Silk, Gerald. Myths and Meanings in Manzoni's Merda d'artista, Art Journal, Vol. 52, No. 3, Autumn, 1993
''Achromes''
Manzoni's work changed irrevocably after visiting Yves Klein's exhibition 'Epoca Blu' at the Galleria Apollinaire in
Milan
Milan ( , , Lombard: ; it, Milano ) is a city in northern Italy, capital of Lombardy, and the second-most populous city proper in Italy after Rome. The city proper has a population of about 1.4 million, while its metropolitan city h ...
, January 1957. This exhibition consisted of 11 identical blue
monochrome
A monochrome or monochromatic image, object or palette is composed of one color (or values of one color). Images using only shades of grey are called grayscale (typically digital) or black-and-white (typically analog). In physics, monochrom ...
s. By the end of the year he had ceased producing work influenced by the prevailing trends in
Art Informel
Informalism or Art Informel is a pictorial movement from the 1943–1950s, that includes all the abstract and gestural tendencies that developed in France and the rest of Europe during the World War II, similar to American abstract expressionis ...
, to works that responded directly to Klein's monochromes. Called ''Achromes'', they invariably looked white but were actually colourless. In these paintings Manzoni experimented with various
pigment
A pigment is a colored material that is completely or nearly insoluble in water. In contrast, dyes are typically soluble, at least at some stage in their use. Generally dyes are often organic compounds whereas pigments are often inorganic compo ...
s and materials. Initially favouring canvases coated in
gesso
Gesso (; "chalk", from the la, gypsum, from el, γύψος) is a white paint mixture consisting of a binder mixed with chalk, gypsum, pigment, or any combination of these. It is used in painting as a preparation for any number of substrates suc ...
(1957–1958), he also worked with
kaolin
Kaolinite ( ) is a clay mineral, with the chemical composition Al2 Si2 O5( OH)4. It is an important industrial mineral. It is a layered silicate mineral, with one tetrahedral sheet of silica () linked through oxygen atoms to one octahedral ...
, another form of white clay often used in the production of
porcelain
Porcelain () is a ceramic material made by heating substances, generally including materials such as kaolinite, in a kiln to temperatures between . The strength and translucence of porcelain, relative to other types of pottery, arises mainl ...
. The kaolin works are generally made from clay covered canvases folded horizontally, or sometimes cut-out squares of canvas coated in the clay and adhered onto the canvas; he created just nine large-scale relief paintings depicting folded cloth. As well as Yves Klein, these works showed the influence of
Lucio Fontana
Lucio Fontana (; 19 February 1899 – 7 September 1968) was an Argentine-Italian painter, sculptor and theorist. He is mostly known as the founder of Spatialism.
Early life
Born in Rosario, to Italian immigrant parents, he was t ...
and
Alberto Burri
Alberto Burri (12 March 191513 February 1995; ) was an Italian visual artist, painter, sculptor, and physician based in Città di Castello. He is associated with the matterism of the European informal art movement and described his style as ...
and the American artist
Robert Rauschenberg
Milton Ernest "Robert" Rauschenberg (October 22, 1925 – May 12, 2008) was an American painter and graphic artist whose early works anticipated the Pop art movement. Rauschenberg is well known for his Combines (1954–1964), a group of artwor ...
, who had painted neutral white canvases in 1951. Later he would create Achromes from white
cotton
Cotton is a soft, fluffy staple fiber that grows in a boll, or protective case, around the seeds of the cotton plants of the genus ''Gossypium'' in the mallow family Malvaceae. The fiber is almost pure cellulose, and can contain minor perce ...
wool,
fiberglass
Fiberglass (American English) or fibreglass (Commonwealth English) is a common type of fiber-reinforced plastic using glass fiber. The fibers may be randomly arranged, flattened into a sheet called a chopped strand mat, or woven into glass cloth ...
,
rabbit
Rabbits, also known as bunnies or bunny rabbits, are small mammals in the family Leporidae (which also contains the hares) of the order Lagomorpha (which also contains the pikas). ''Oryctolagus cuniculus'' includes the European rabbit speci ...
skin and bread rolls. He also experimented with
phosphorescent
Phosphorescence is a type of photoluminescence related to fluorescence. When exposed to light (radiation) of a shorter wavelength, a phosphorescent substance will glow, absorbing the light and reemitting it at a longer wavelength. Unlike fluor ...
paint and
cobalt chloride Cobalt chloride (cobalt paper) may refer to:
* Cobalt(II) chloride
Cobalt(II) chloride is an inorganic compound of cobalt and chlorine, with the formula . The compound forms several hydrates ·''n'', for ''n'' = 1, 2, 6, and 9. Claims of the fo ...
so that the colours would change over time. In addition to these fabricated materials, the artist's own bodily products and features became art. In addition to his famous ''
Artist's Shit
''Artist's Shit'' (Italian: ) is a 1961 artwork by the Italian artist Piero Manzoni. The work consists of 90 tin cans, each reportedly filled with of faeces, and measuring , with a label in Italian, English, French, and German stating:
Inspi ...
'' (''Merda d'artista)'', in which Manzoni's own excrement became a series of art objects, the use of
fingerprint
A fingerprint is an impression left by the friction ridges of a human finger. The recovery of partial fingerprints from a crime scene is an important method of forensic science. Moisture and grease on a finger result in fingerprints on surfac ...
s, blood, and breath also figured into his experimental body of work.
Azimut Gallery
Manzoni founded the Azimut Gallery in Milan in 1959 with the artist
Enrico Castellani
Enrico Castellani (4 August 1930 – 1 December 2017) was an Italian artist. He was active in Italy from the early 1960s, and associated with Piero Manzoni and . Castellani is known for his "paintings of light". He studied at the Ecole Nationale S ...
, and staged a series of revolutionary exhibitions of multiples. The first, '' 12 Linee'' (''12 Lines'') took place in December 1959, quickly followed by '' Corpi d'Aria'' (''Bodies of Air'') in May 1960. This was an edition of 45 balloons on
tripod
A tripod is a portable three-legged frame or stand, used as a platform for supporting the weight and maintaining the stability of some other object. The three-legged (triangular stance) design provides good stability against gravitational loads ...
s that could be blown up by the buyer, or the artist himself, depending on the price paid. In July 1960 he exhibited ''Consumption of Art by the Art-Devouring Public'', in which he hard-boiled 70 eggs, printed his thumbprint onto them, and after eating several himself handed them out to the audience to eat. The eggs themselves were titled ''Uova con impronta'' (Egg With Thumbprint). This was the last exhibition by Manzoni at Azimuth, after which the gallery was forced to close when the lease ran out. Although the invitation named the Gallery Azimuth as the location of the opening, the actual event took place at the Studio Filmgiornale Sedi in Milan. The discrepancy between the location on the invitation and the
film studio
A film studio (also known as movie studio or simply studio) is a major entertainment company or motion picture company that has its own privately owned studio facility or facilities that are used to make films, which is handled by the production ...
where the event was recorded further complicates the role and space of art as it was expected to be seen.
''Artist's Breath''
Contemporaneously with the '' Bodies of Air'' (''Corpi D'Aria''), Manzoni produced the ''Artist's Breaths'' (''Fiato d'Artista''), a series of red, white or blue balloons, inflated and attached to a wooden base inscribed "Piero Manzoni- Artist's Breath". The works continued Manzoni's obsession with the limits of physicality, whilst parodying the Art World's obsession with permanence, and also provided a poignant
Memento Mori
''Memento mori'' (Latin for 'remember that you ave todie'
In May 1961 Manzoni created 90 small cans, sealed with the text ''
Artist's Shit
''Artist's Shit'' (Italian: ) is a 1961 artwork by the Italian artist Piero Manzoni. The work consists of 90 tin cans, each reportedly filled with of faeces, and measuring , with a label in Italian, English, French, and German stating:
Inspi ...
'' (''Merda d'Artista''). Each 30-gram can was priced by weight based on the current value of gold (around $1.12 a gram in 1960). The contents of the cans remain a much-disputed enigma, since opening them would destroy the value of the artwork. Various theories about the contents have been proposed, including speculation that it is plaster. In the following years, the cans have spread to various art collections all over the world and netted large prices, far outstripping inflation.
A tin was sold for
€
The euro sign () is the currency sign used for the euro, the official currency of the eurozone and unilaterally adopted by Kosovo and Montenegro. The design was presented to the public by the European Commission on 12 December 1996. It consists ...
124,000 at
Sotheby's
Sotheby's () is a British-founded American multinational corporation with headquarters in New York City. It is one of the world's largest brokers of fine and decorative art, jewellery, and collectibles. It has 80 locations in 40 countries, and ...
on May 23, 2007; in October 2008 tin 83 was offered for sale at Sotheby's with an estimate of £ 50–70,000. It sold for £97,250. It was described as:
On October 16, 2015, tin 54 was sold at Christies for the astonishing sum of £182,500. The tins were originally to be valued according to their equivalent weight in gold – $37 each in 1961 – with the price fluctuating according to the market.
Other works from this period include limited edition thumbprints, and the ''Declarations of Authenticity'', 1961-61, a printed multiple that could be bought, proving the owner's status as either part or whole work of art, depending on the price paid. He also designated a number of people, including
Umberto Eco
Umberto Eco (5 January 1932 – 19 February 2016) was an Italian medievalist, philosopher, semiotician, novelist, cultural critic, and political and social commentator. In English, he is best known for his popular 1980 novel ''The Name of the ...
, as authentic works of art gratis.
Various other experimental pieces by Manzoni included trying to create a mechanical animal as a moving sculpture and using
solar energy
Solar energy is radiant light and heat from the Sun that is harnessed using a range of technologies such as solar power to generate electricity, solar thermal energy (including solar water heating), and solar architecture. It is an essenti ...
as a power source. In 1960 he created a sphere that was held aloft on a jet of air.
Other works
*''Magic Bases'' (''Magisk Sockkel'', 1961), a series of wooden
plinth
A pedestal (from French ''piédestal'', Italian ''piedistallo'' 'foot of a stall') or plinth is a support at the bottom of a statue, vase, column, or certain altars. Smaller pedestals, especially if round in shape, may be called socles. In c ...
s that could be stood on to acquire status of 'Living Sculpture'.
*'' Lines of Exceptional Length'' (1960–61). Lines drawn on paper, the longest of which was 7.2 km, intended to be left in every major city in the world, which would equal the length of the
equator
The equator is a circle of latitude, about in circumference, that divides Earth into the Northern and Southern hemispheres. It is an imaginary line located at 0 degrees latitude, halfway between the North and South poles. The term can als ...
when joined.
*''Base of the World'' (''Socle du Monde'', 1961). A large metal plinth, inscribed 'The Base Of The World, Homage To Galileo' placed upside down in a field in
Herning, Denmark
Herning () is a Danish town in the Central Denmark Region of the Jutland peninsula. It is the main town and the administrative seat of Herning Municipality. Herning has a population of 50,565 (1 January 2022)artist's book
Artists' books (or book arts or book objects) are works of art that utilize the form of the book. They are often published in small editions, though they are sometimes produced as one-of-a-kind objects.
Overview
Artists' books have employed a ...
consisting of 100 sheets of transparent plastic bound to a white metal sheet. The only text is the title page. The rest of the book is totally blank.
Exhibitions
Manzoni's works were often featured at Galleria Azimuth. His work has been the subject of numerous international exhibitions, including
retrospectives
A retrospective (from Latin ''retrospectare'', "look back"), generally, is a look back at events that took place, or works that were produced, in the past. As a noun, ''retrospective'' has specific meanings in medicine, software development, popu ...
Serpentine Gallery
The Serpentine Galleries are two contemporary art galleries in Kensington Gardens, Hyde Park, Central London. Recently rebranded to just Serpentine, the organisation is split across Serpentine South, previously known as the Serpentine Gallery, ...
, London (1998), at the Museo d'Arte Contemporanea Donnaregina, Naples (2007), curated by
Germano Celant
Germano Celant (11 September 1940 – 29 April 2020) was an Italian art historian, critic and curator who coined the term " Arte Povera" (poor art) in 1967 and wrote many articles and books on the subject.
Work
Germano Celant was born in Genoa ...
, and in 2019 "Piero Manzoni: Materials of His Time" at
Hauser & Wirth
Hauser & Wirth is a Swiss contemporary and modern art gallery.
History
Hauser & Wirth was founded in 1992 in Zurich by Iwan Wirth, Manuela Wirth, and Ursula Hauser, who were joined in 2000 by co-president Marc Payot. In 2020, Ewan Venters was ap ...
's Los Angeles and then New York City galleries.Piero Manzoni
Gagosian Gallery
Gagosian is a contemporary art gallery owned and directed by Larry Gagosian. The gallery exhibits some of the most influential artists of the 20th and 21st centuries. There are 16 gallery spaces: five in New York City; three in London; two in Par ...
.
Collections
Manzoni's work is represented in many public collections, including the
Museum of Modern Art
The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is an art museum located in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, on 53rd Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenues.
It plays a major role in developing and collecting modern art, and is often identified as one of ...
, New York;
Stedelijk Museum
The Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam (; Municipal Museum Amsterdam), colloquially known as the Stedelijk, is a museum for modern art, contemporary art, and design located in Amsterdam, Netherlands.
, Amsterdam;
Tate Modern
Tate Modern is an art gallery located in London. It houses the United Kingdom's national collection of international modern and contemporary art, and forms part of the Tate group together with Tate Britain, Tate Liverpool and Tate St Ives. It is ...
, London; the Galleria Civica d'Arte Moderna e Contemporanea,
Turin
Turin ( , Piedmontese language, Piedmontese: ; it, Torino ) is a city and an important business and cultural centre in Northern Italy. It is the capital city of Piedmont and of the Metropolitan City of Turin, and was the first Italian capital ...
Fondazione Piero Manzoni, a family-run Italian foundation, oversees the artist’s estate. It has been represented by
Hauser & Wirth
Hauser & Wirth is a Swiss contemporary and modern art gallery.
History
Hauser & Wirth was founded in 1992 in Zurich by Iwan Wirth, Manuela Wirth, and Ursula Hauser, who were joined in 2000 by co-president Marc Payot. In 2020, Ewan Venters was ap ...
ARTnews
''ARTnews'' is an American visual-arts magazine, based in New York City. It covers art from ancient to contemporary times. ARTnews is the oldest and most widely distributed art magazine in the world. It has a readership of 180,000 in 124 countri ...
''.
See also
*
Conceptual Art
Conceptual art, also referred to as conceptualism, is art in which the concept(s) or idea(s) involved in the work take precedence over traditional aesthetic, technical, and material concerns. Some works of conceptual art, sometimes called insta ...
Artist's Shit
''Artist's Shit'' (Italian: ) is a 1961 artwork by the Italian artist Piero Manzoni. The work consists of 90 tin cans, each reportedly filled with of faeces, and measuring , with a label in Italian, English, French, and German stating:
Inspi ...
''- Piero Manzoni. Catalogo Generale'', edited by G. Celant, Prearo Editore, Milan, 1975.
''- Piero Manzoni. Catalogue raisonné'', edited by F. Battino, L. Palazzoli, Edizioni di Vanni Scheiwiller, Milan, 1991.
- ''Piero Manzoni. General catalogue'', edited by G. Celant, interview of G. Celant, Skira, Geneva-Milan, 2004.
- ''Piero Manzoni'', edited by G. Celant, exhibition catalogue (MADRE Museo di Arte Contemporanea Donnaregina, Naple), Electa, Milan, 2007.
- ''Piero Manzoni: Azimut'', exhibition catalogue (Gagosian Gallery, London), Gagosian Gallery, 2011.
- P. Manzoni, ''Diario'', edited by G. L. Marcone, Mondadori Electa, Milan, 2013.
- F. Pola, ''Una visione internazionale. Piero Manzoni e Albisola'', Mondadori Electa, Milan, 2013.
- G. Celant, ''Su Piero Manzoni'', Abscondita, Milan, 2014.
- F. Gualdoni, ''Breve storia della “Merda d’artista”'', Skira, Geneva-Milan, 2014.
- E. Manzoni, ''Caro Piero'', Skira, Geneva-Milan, 2014.
- F. Pola, ''Piero Manzoni and ZERO. A European Creative Region'', Mondadori Electa, Milan, 2014.
- A. Bettinetti, ''Piero Manzoni, Artist'', Cinehollywood, 2014 (DVD).
- ''Piero Manzoni 1933-1963'', edited by F. Gualdoni and R. Pasqualino di Marineo, exhibition catalogue, (Palazzo Reale, Milan), Skira, Geneva-Milan, 2014.
- G. Pautasso, ''Piero Manzoni. Divorare l’arte'', Mondadori Electa, Milan, 2015.
- ''AZIMUT/H. Continuity and Newness'', edited by L. Barbero, exhibition catalogue (Peggy Guggenheim Collection, Venice), Marsilio Editori, Venice, 2015.
- ''Piero Manzoni, Achrome'', edited by C. Léveque-Claudet and C. Kazarian, exhibition catalogue (Musée cantonal des Beaux-Arts de Lausanne, Lausanne), Editions Hazan, Lausanne, 2016.
- ''Piero Manzoni. Nuovi studi'', edited by R. Pasqualino di Marineo, Carlo Cambi Editore, Poggibonsi, 2017.
- R. Perna, ''Piero Manzoni e Roma'', Mondadori Electa, Milan, 2017.
- ''Piero Manzoni. Materials of His Time'' and ''Lines'', edited by R. Pasqualino di Marineo, exhibition catalogue (Hauser & Wirth, Los Angeles and New York), Hauser & Wirth Publishers, Zürich, 2019.
- F. Gualdoni, ''Piero Manzoni. An Artist's Life'', Gagosian, New York, 2019.
- P. Manzoni, ''Piero Manzoni. Writings on Art'', edited by G. L. Marcone, Hauser & Wirth Publishers, Zürich, 2019.
- ''Merda d’artista Künstlerscheisse Merde d’artiste Artist's Shit'', Carlo Cambi Editore, Poggibonsi, 2021.