Gallery views of Michelangelo Pistoletto: From One to Many,
1956-1974 at the Philadelphia Museum of Art. Artworks © Michelangelo Pistoletto
Michelangelo Pistoletto: From One to Many, 1956–1974
November 2, 2010 - January 17, 2011
by Emily Steinberg
On a bitterly cold Friday night I went to check out the Michelangelo Pistoletto show at the PMA. I'm very glad I did. Pistoletto, Italian, born 1933, is a great painter and possesses a wonderful, playful imagination. You enter into the first gallery and are immediately confronted with a room full of life size standing self portraits of the artist. It is very interesting to see the figure being painted in the mid 1960's. In America at that time, painting from life was considered passe, but Europeans have always been more friendly to the human form. The figures stand alone and somewhat majestically against a single toned background. Eventually he began using varnish on the paintings, creating reflective surfaces that catch and include the activity of the gallery into the pictures.
He soon gave up painting on canvas entirely, opting instead to use polished steel panels as the surface for his work. The glassy panels truly exploit the reflective nature of his work. His classically graceful, almost life size figures are traced from enlarged photographs onto tissue paper, painted and then affixed to the steel panels. The panels are arrayed around the airy galleries and create an endless space that is repeated from image to image, constantly changing and includes the viewer at all times. It's a heady mix. It is a large show, 10 rooms, and the work spans a 20 year period in the life of this bright, engaging and eminently human artist. Go see the show if you can. It will be up through this weekend.
Read the PMA Gallery Guide for the exhibit. It includes photographs, history, and a thoughtful essay on the artist.
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