MATERIALS: Wooden seat, branding on leather, brass plate
DIMENSIONS: 94 × 59 × 69 cm
PROVENANCE: The artist
COLLECTION: Fabio Mauri Estate, Rome
CATALOGUE: O_1971_323
Chair with wooden shell and leather-lined seat. Two lighter leather squares, themselves divided in half by a seam, stand out on the seat and backrest, on which the word ‘Ebrea’ (Jewess) is fire- branded four times. On the left-hand armrest, a brass plaque bears the work’s title, which renders the dystopia of a world marked by the fulfilment of the Nazi plan whereby racialised bodies, reduced to mere organic matter, were commonly used to make furniture and objects. The work was part of the ‘Ebrea’ exhibition-installation (inv. 3476). In its early arrangements, it featured a black drape with the words ‘THE END’ (later removed by the artist) hanging from the rear of the backrest. In 2001, Mauri had a one-to-one scale technical survey of the work done (inv. 317), framed and displayed on the wall, in close dialogue with the chair (inv. 3740).
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.
1978, Bologna, Galleria d’Arte Moderna and church of Santa Lucia, Metafisica del quotidiano, 1 June – 31 August, curated by Franco Solmi, Marilena Pasquali.
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, Rome, Galleria Nazionale d’Arte Moderna e Contemporanea, Fabio Mauri. Opere e Azioni 1954-1994, 21 June – 5 October, curated by Carolyn Christov-Bakargiev, Marcella Cossu.
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, Warsaw, Ujazdowski Castle – Centre for Contemporary Art, Belvedere Italiano. Linee di tendenza dell’arte italiana dal 1945 al 2001, 18 June – 22 July, curated by Achille Bonito Oliva.
2002-2003, Rome, Macro – Museo d’Arte Contemporanea Roma, Ipotesi di collezione, 11 October 2002 – 11 January 2003.
2004-2005, Genoa, Museo d’Arte Contemporanea di Villa Croce, Attraversare Genova. Percorsi e linguaggi del contemporaneo: anni ’60-’70, 10 November 2004 – 30 January 2005, curated by Sandra Solimano.
2009, Martina Franca (Taranto), Palazzo Barnaba, Metessi 2: una storia in cerca di diversità impreviste, 31 January – 14 March, curated by Gabriele Perretta.
2012, Milan, Palazzo Reale, Fabio Mauri – The End, 19 June – 23 September, curated by Francesca Alfano Miglietti.
2018, New York, Hauser & Wirth, With Out, 25 January – 7 April, curated by Olivier Renaud-Clément.
Data, Year II, no. 2, Giampaolo Prearo, Milan, February 1972, p. 2 (ill.).
Franco Gherardi, “Una poltrona fatta con la pelle della signorina Citterich, ebrea”, in Giorni Vie Nuove, Year 2, no. 2, Milan, 12 January 1972, p. 68 (ill.).
Fabio Mauri, Der Politische Ventilator (Milan: Achille Mauri – Krachmalnicoff, 1973), p. 50 (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), pp. 50–51 (ill.).
Fabio Mauri. Opere e Azioni 1954-1994, exhibition catalogue, Galleria Nazionale d’Arte Moderna e Contemporanea, Rome, edited by Carolyn Christov-Bakargiev, Marcella Cossu (Milan / Rome: Editoriale Giorgio Mondadori / Carte Segrete, 1994), p. 122 (ill.).
Fabio Mauri: Male e bellezza – Das Böse und das Schöne, exhibition catalogue, Kunsthalle, Klagenfurt, edited by Arnulf Rohsmann (Klagenfurt, 1997), p. 107 (ill.).
Belvedere italiano: Linee di tendenza nell’arte contemporanea 1945-2001, exhibition catalogue, Ujazdowski Castle – Centre for Contemporary Art, Warsaw, edited by Achille Bonito Oliva (Rome: Gangemi editore, 2001), p. 64 (ill.).
Adachiara Zevi, “L'arte ‘saggistica’ di Fabio Mauri”, in L’architettura – cronache e storia, no. 575, Rome, 2003, p. 668 (ill.).
Attraversare Genova: Percorsi e linguaggi internazionali del contemporaneo. Anni ’60-’70, exhibition catalogue, Museo d’Arte Contemporanea di Villa Croce, Genoa, edited by Sandra Solimano (Milan: Skira, 2004), p. 257 (ill.).
Alias, no. 43, Rome, 30 October 2004, p. 18 (ill.).
L’immaginazione al potere: l’arte, gli artisti e il ’68: Metessi 2: una storia in cerca di diversità impreviste, exhibition catalogue, Palazzo Barnaba, Martina Franca (Taranto), edited by Gabriele Perretta (Martina Franca: Associazione Amici dell’Arte Studio Carrieri, Fondazione Noesi, 2008), p. 9 (ill.).
Angelo Capasso, “Quando la Storia si trasforma in arte”, in Liberal, Rome, 26 September 2009, p. 20 (ill.).
Elena Pirazzoli, A partire da ciò che resta. Forme memoriali dal 1945 alle macerie del Muro di Berlino (Reggio Emilia: Diabasis, 2010), p. 66 (ill.).
Alfabeta 2, Year I, no. 2, Milan, September 2010, p. 8 (ill.).
Fabio Mauri. The End, exhibition catalogue, Palazzo Reale, Milan, edited by Francesca Alfano Miglietti (Milan: Skira, 2012), p. 54 (ill.).
Marco Marini, “Fabio Mauri. La percezione come insieme di memoria”, in Nodes, no. 0, Numero Cromatico, Rome, 2012, p. 75 (ill.).
Laura Cherubini, “Jewess”, in Fabio Mauri. Ideology and Memory, edited by Studio Fabio Mauri (Turin: Bollati Boringhieri, 2012), p. 57 (ill.).
Lea Mattarella, “Fabio Mauri - Quando l'arte mette in scena tutto l'orrore del Novecento”, in la Repubblica, Year 37, no. 185, Rome, 5 August 2012, p. 44 (ill.).
Vice versa: 55. Esposizione Internazionale d’Arte di Venezia, exhibition catalogue, La Biennale, Venice, edited by Bartolomeo Pietromarchi (Milan: Mousse Publishing, 2013), p. 134 (ill.).
Valérie Da Costa, Fabio Mauri: le passé en actes (Dijon: Les presses du réel, 2018), no. 64, p. 118 (ill.).
Roberto Andreotti, Federico De Melis, “Allegria e angoscia di un decostruttore”, in Alias, Rome, 31 August 2025, pp. 7–9 (ill.).
