MATERIALS: Digital projection on engraved wall, cables, corrugated pipes, electrical boxes
PROJECTION: Grigory Naumovich Chukhray, Ballad of a Soldier , 1959
Digital, black and white, sound, 88 min., loop
DIMENSIONS: Site-specific
PROVENANCE: The artist
COLLECTION: Fabio Mauri Estate, Rome
CATALOGUE: PR_2005_1015
Three contiguous white walls with open chasing from which hanks of cabling and girders spill out onto the floor in large quantities, like the innards of some inert body. On the central wall, a projection of Grigory Naumovich Chukhray’s film Ballad of a Soldier recounts the adventures of a soldier who returns home from war for a short leave. ‘At Volume! in Rome, I flayed out the walls, gouging out the pipes and wires. It came to me as I was walking around houses and construction sites, seeing these wonderful buildings, the walls vomiting up their own innards in the light. Cinema, that is, the inherent narrative of the mode, meaning or search for meaning, which is, which was, the structural key to the world, comes out and I represent it in this way […] I would like to knock everything down and work with the innards of the world.’1
1. F. Mauri in M. Silvi, ‘Conversazione con Fabio Mauri’, in M.R. Sossai, Film d’artista, Silvana Editoriale, Cinisello Balsamo, 2008, p. 113.
2005-2006, Rome, La Nuova Pesa, Murato Vivo, 12 December 2005 – 21 January 2006, curated by Giacomo Zaza.
2009, Monfalcone (Gorizia), GC.AC. – Galleria Comunale d’Arte Contemporanea, Fabio Mauri, 10 October – 1 November, curated by Andrea Bruciati.
2016-2017, Naples, Museo Madre, Retrospettiva a luce solida, 26 November 2016 – 6 March 2017, curated by Laura Cherubini, Andrea Viliani.
Carlo Alberto Bucci, “La vita scorre sui muri sbrecciati dai fotogrammi”, in la Repubblica, Rome, 16 December 2005, pp. XIV-XV (ill.).
Manuela De Leonardis, “Fabio Mauri. Roma, Volume! e La Nuova Pesa”, in Exibart, www.exibart.com, Rome, 20 December 2005, (ill.).
Simona Cresci, “Fabio Mauri. La Nuova Pesa / Volume!”, in Flash Art, no. 256, Milan, February–March 2006, p. 112.
Ilaria Piccioni, “Fabio Mauri. La Nuova Pesa. Centro per l'Arte Contemporanea”, in Segno, no. 206, Pescara, January–February 2006, p. 87 (ill.).
Franco Di Matteo, “Fabio Mauri. Non pensare, osserva”, in Arte contemporanea, Year II, no. 5, Rome, January–February 2007, p. 80 (ill.).
Laura Cherubini, “Fabio Mauri. Un pensiero fisico”, in Flash Art, Year XL, no. 266, Milan, October–November 2007, p. 83.
Maria Rosa Sossai, Film d’artista. Percorsi e confronti tra arte e cinema (Cinisello Balsamo: Silvana Editoriale, 2008), pp. 112–113.
Fabio Mauri, Scritti in mostra. L’avanguardia come zona 1958-2008, edited by Francesca Alfano Miglietti (Milan: il Saggiatore, 2008), pp. 139–141 (ill.).
Fabio Mauri, Io sono un ariano (Milan: Lampi di stampa, 2009), pp. 415–429 (ill.).
Laura Cherubini, “Conversazioni. Ricordando Fabio Mauri”, in Flash Art International, Year XLIII, no. 275, Milan, November–December 2010, p. 64 (ill.).
Elisabetta Catalano, Work with Fabio Mauri, edited by Laura Cherubini (Milan: Maretti Editore, 2013), p. 145 (ill.).
Laura Cherubini, Contro corrente: I grandi solitari dell’arte italiana: Alighiero Boetti, Gino De Dominicis, Luciano Fabro, Fabio Mauri, Vettor Pisani, Marisa Merz (Milan: Christian Marinotti edizioni, 2020), p. 121.
