Morandi - paintings
Morandi - video - Painting a pighead in front of a Giorgio Morandi
Morandi - video - Triste, triste, triste - the paint dealer of a Girogio Morandi
Morandi - stuff
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Painting a Pig Head in front of a Giorgio Morandi
Bologna 2012 - 20 min
Painting a pighead in front of a Giorgio Morandishows me doing exactly what the title claims: Painting a pighead in front of a Giorgio Morandithough I have never painted nor attended any painting classes. I bought some oil paint, some pighead and put myself infront of an original Morandi painting at Galleria d'Arte Maggiore, Bologna with a sales price of 1 200 000 Euro. Several attemps by me to gain access to either the Museum Morandi or the Studio Morandi - both are open to the pubic - for this work were rejected with the rather curious argument that my project has nothing to do with Morandi.
At the art supply show I met a person who sold directly to Giorgio Morandi who was shopping there unitl his death in 1964. He advised me not only on the colors and on the canvas but also introduced me to his former boss Carlo Carlotti who worked as a paint saller (Mesticatore) for Morandi between the 1940s and his death. I was also able to interview and get some really nice stories to hear with we recorded in the interview entiteld: TRISTE TRISTE TRISTE - THE PAINT DEALER OF A GIORGIO MORANDI.
Girogrio Morandi (1890 - 1964) spent his entrie life in Bologna - almost never left town - and painted apart of some landscape paintings exclusively very reduced still lifes containing bottles and other simple containers in a very uni-colored haze. Given his biography, he participated in WWI and lived through WWII, he saw most of his life poverty and gave expression to it. His paint seller called him 'triste', sad, and described his paintings also as "triste, triste, triste".
Wikipedia describes his style as followed: "Morandi was perceived as one of the few Italian artists of his generation to have escaped the taint of Fascism, and to have evolved a style of pure pictorial values congenial to modernist abstraction. Through his simple and repetitive motifs and economical use of color, value and surface, Morandi became a prescient and important forerunner of Minimalism."
The paintings and the video are part of works that deal with the current state of our economy which can be best described by the financial term CREDIT CRUNCH that started in 2008 with the near collapse of the entire world financial system. Today, Europe too is so endangered of a financial melt down that is not only limited to the defacdto bancrupt Greece but one that also threatens Portugal, Spain, Italy, Ireland and could even pull down others. The EURO itself is anything but stable and talks about its demise are everywhere.
This video was made in Bologna, Italy first shown at a group show curated by Lorenzo Bruni at Galleria Astuni.
Camera: Fabio Piccione. Assistence: Sara Corona.
See video:
see paintings: Painting a pighead in front of Giorgio Morandi
other Morandi stuff
photos taken during filming
FINALS:
PIG HEADS ARE BEAUTIFUL ...
Giorgio Morandi, Natura morta, 1948, oil on canvas, 36 x 36 cm
Courtesy of this Morandi is Galleria d'Arte Maggiore, Bologna - estimated value: I .2 Million Euros
SEE THE FINAL PAINTINGS HERE
also from an interview between Johan Hartle and me entitled the abstract faces of the rulling class
Johan Hartle: The pig’s head, of course, alludes to classics of political iconography. George Grosz’ Faces of the Ruling Class –
one could even think of Orwell’s Animal Farm – all these traditions of political caricature come back in the pig’s head,
which has normally been used as an open assault: But why a pig and who is the pig?
Rainer Ganahl: A very good question! Who is the pig? I guess every participant whether they profited or lost in the game can
be blamed for the current mess. Creditors and debtors alike, as well as all the people who set up and controlled
the regulatory context which failed the system. This is not to diminish the culpability of architects of SUBPRIME
MORTGAGES, that were resold as investments with TRIPLE A RATINGS worldwide for eccentric profits; of the
legislators who eliminated the Glass-Steagall Act, that separated investment banking from commercial and retail
banking respecting conflicts of interests thus driving up MORTGAGE BACKED SECURITIES and COLLATERALIZED
DEBT OBLIGATIONS (CDOs) – essential factors in bringing down the system in 2007/2008; or of the creative
accounting that manipulated financial profiles in the USA and in Europe. PORTUGAL, ITALY, (IRELAND), GREECE and
SPAIN – referred to as PIGS – all have special stories to tell when it comes to balance sheet manipulations, tax evasion,
corruption and irresponsible economic politics. Needless to say, in the USA a decade of reckless waste of resources
on two disastrous unnecessary wars in combinations with reducing taxation to unsustainably low record levels also not
only weakens the nation and its capacity to rescue its economy but also increases political unpredictability, paralysis
and bad decision making aggravating the socio-economic and financial situation.
Being myself a big fan of George Grosz, I must admit that in most cases the “faces of the ruling class” bear features
of the Sus family. A decapitated sample of such a creature also works the senses of the visitor rather very quickly
and poses a health risk within a short period of time – hence a perfect prop for this still life inspired assembly of food
sculptures. For this particular setting in New York, the pig had the pleasure of vicinity to some of the biggest financial
institutions operating in the USA as well as three large companies that just went into BANKRUPTCY proceeding
around the time the event took place: SOLYNDRA – a solar panel company that received a 500 million dollar state
loan guarantee just months before it declared BANKRUPTCY, defrauding the government giving one more example
how profits are kept private and losses get socialized – FM GLOBAL, an investment company where 1.2 billion
dollars evaporated just a day before my exhibition and DEXIA, a Belgian bank that needed a massive bailout (to
prevent BANKRUPTCY) by not only Belgium but even France – a good example of a TOO BIG TO FAIL firm, an
inherent candidate to fit the piggy-label. These three large carrots were placed in front of the nose of my badly
shaved pig that showed obvious signs of a violent interruption of its life cycle.
Morandi - paintings
Morandi - video - Painting a pighead in front of Giorgio Morandi
Morandi - video - Triste, triste, triste - the paint dealer of Girogio Morandi
Morandi - stuff