Author Description

The first volume of the Catalogue Raisonné dedicated to Mario Schifano's pictorial work explores the artist's 1960s-production. The result of an over 14-year research conducted by Archivio Mario Schifano, the publication is divided in four volumes, each dedicated to a single decade. This first volume presents the works which the artist created from 1960 to 1969, with 500 high-resolution pictures and about 300 mainly so-far unpublished photographs from Schifano's personal archive, Achivio Ugo Mulas, and the Camilla and Earl McGrath Foundation. Schifano made his artistic debut in 1960 with an exhibition in Rome presented by Pierre Restany and immediately captured the critics' interest with his monochrome paintings evocative of the photographic screens that would later incorporate numbers, letters, road signs, and Esso and Coca Cola logos. In 1963 he travelled to the United States and his works started to include quotations from the history of Italian art and Futurism. Besides his solo shows and his participation in national and international group exhibitions, during the 1960s Schifano also worked on full-length films, directed three experimental films, and collaborated with a psychedelic rock band.