MATERIALS: Bathroom cabinet with mirror, jar, scissors, glue tube, toothbrush, soap, paper, cloth, hair
DIMENSIONS: 59 × 36 × 32 cm
PROVENANCE: The artist
COLLECTION: The Jewish Museum, New York
CATALOGUE: O_1971_308
This bathroom cabinet with mirror and wooden shelf was the only prop in the 1971 Ebrea performance (inv. 3476). A piece of soap resting on a cloth, a small round box, a tin can containing a pair of scissors, a toothbrush, and a small tube are visible on the shelf. Hanging on a nail next to the mirror is the shirt worn by the performer. Composed from strands of synthetic hair, the Star of David in the centre of the mirror is evocative of the action. In 2000, the cabinet was donated to the Jewish Museum in New York. Mauri commissioned a second copy of the work in 2001 for exclusive performance-related use.
1971, Venice, Galleria Barozzi, Ebrea, opening 1 October, curated by Furio Colombo, Renato Barilli.
1971, Brescia, Galleria Acme Studio, Ebrea, opening 30 October (travelling: 1971, Venice).
1971, Parma, Galleria La Steccata, Ebrea, opening 18 November (travelling: 1971, Venice).
1971, Rome, Galleria La Salita, Ebrea, opening 9 December (travelling: 1971, Venice).
1974, Milan, Galleria Cenobio Visualità, “D.P.V.”: Ebrea, 13 February.
1975, Torre del Greco (Naples), Teatro Laboratorio, Ebrea (action), in Il corpo come linguaggio, 18 January.
1993, Venice, Giardini di Castello, Italian Pavilion, XLV Esposizione Internazionale d’Arte – Punti cardinali dell’arte, 14 June – 10 October, curated by Achille Bonito Oliva.
1994, London, Smith’s Galleries, Four Italian Masters of Contemporary Art, 20 October – 6 December.
1997, Klagenfurt, Kunsthalle, Fabio Mauri. Male e bellezza / Das Böse und das Schöne, 24 April – 30 June, curated by Arnulf Rohsmann.
1998-1999, Rome, Spazio per l’arte contemporanea Tor Bella Monaca, 20 mostre a La Salita dal 1960 al 1978, 2 December 1998 – 10 January 1999.
2001, New York, The Jewish Museum, Voice, Image, Gesture, 25 March – 5 August.
2008-2009, New York, The Jewish Museum, Theaters of Memory: Art and the Holocaust, 16 October 2008 – 1 February 2009.
2009-2010, New York, The Jewish Museum, Culture And Continuity: The Jewish Journey, 11 February 2009 – 7 December 2010.
2018-2019, New York, The Jewish Museum, Scenes from the Collection, Signs and Symbols: Star of David, 18 July 2018 – 31 March 2019.
Data, Year II, no. 2, Giampaolo Prearo, Milan, February 1972, p. 2 (ill.).
Fabio Mauri, Der Politische Ventilator (Milan: Achille Mauri – Krachmalnicoff, 1973), p. 67 (ill.).
Lea Vergine, Il corpo come linguaggio (La “Body-art” e storie simili) (Milan: Giampaolo Prearo Editore, 1974), n.p. (ill.).
Mario de Candia, “Una performance? No, un autentico rito religioso”, in Il piacere dell’occhio, Rome, 25 March 1993, p. 37 (ill.).
Francesco Poli, “Ebrea e il Muro Occidentale di Fabio Mauri”, in XLV Esposizione Internazionale d’Arte: Punti cardinali dell’arte, exhibition catalogue, La Biennale, Venice, edited by Achille Bonito Oliva (Venice: Marsilio, 1993), p. 50.
E. Hirtenfelder, “Das Böse und das Schöne”, in Kleine Zeitung, Klagenfurt, 25 April 1997, (ill.).
Maurice Berger et al., Masterworks Of The Jewish Museum (New York: The Jewish Museum, 2004), p. 66.
Fabio Mauri. The End, exhibition catalogue, Palazzo Reale, Milan, edited by Francesca Alfano Miglietti (Milan: Skira, 2012), p. 53 (ill.).
