Mario Davico

• Edited by Pino Mantovani
• Contributors Testi di Flaminio Gualdoni, Cristina Valota, Franco Fanelli e Riccardo Cavallo
• Size 21x25 cm
• Binding Paperback
• Pages 144
• Illustrations 160
• Language Italian
• Year 2019
• ISBN 9788842224914
• Price € 30,00  € 28,50

The artist who was “there and not there” in the post-war history of art

Mario Davico (1920-2010) was a painter whose worth was recognised by the Italian (Art Club exhibitions, sustained presence at the Venice Biennale and the Rome Quadriennale, Awards, etc.) and international world of art (exhibitions in France and other European countries, in the US, Japan, Australia) from the late 1940s to the mid 1960s. His choice to retire from the spotlight, while continuing to develop his research in touch with certain forms of contemporary “reflective” art, led to his name being gradually forgotten. This is the first systematic study conducted by specialists of his work taking distance from the artist's debatable selections, after the Retrospective exhibition at Turin's Accademia Albertina, for which the artist selected the works and curated the catalogue.In Davico's eyes, “the right place” is the studio, where the artist feels the joy that leads to reflection and action, a concentrated and confident atmosphere that sees the birth of the artwork and justifies its existence. While the experience of exposing his work to the public's eye has always had an element of trauma for the artist, a feeling of violation and attack on his own intellectual privacy and the authentic nature of his works, all that changed with the radical choices of the last season. In any case, Davico never thought of himself as a “pioneer”, especially where the behavioural and mundane aspects of his work are concerned. His informed, always conscious presence in the artistic milieus is valuable, as it offers indispensable fodder to his questioning thoughts on art, to his ferociously critical and self-critical scrutiny which finds itself in action, namely in the intellectual and existential free zone of the studio, where all that matters is painting, above all other circumstances, any terminism, any mundane accident.