MATERIALS: Tempera on paper
DIMENSIONS: 67 × 101 cm
PROVENANCE: The artist
COLLECTION: Fabio Mauri Estate, Rome
CATALOGUE: S_1988_332
A black frame painted along the edges of a white sheet frames the phrase ‘Questo quadro è ariano’, written in the middle of a screen-like drawing. The artwork pre-dates the ‘Aryan objects’ from the ‘Arierwiege’ exhibition-installation (inv. 1023) by a few years. At this exhibition, the attribute ‘Aryan’ was adopted as an ideological index of the absurd ‘concept of belonging to something that precedes you and confers value or disvalue, such as the concept of race.’1 For greater insight into the concept of ‘schermo’ in Mauri’s work, see the introductory essays.
1. F. Mauri, 'Arierwiege: Macchina per pesare l’ariano o Pesariani', 1995, unpublished text, Fabio Mauri Archive, Rome.
1994, Florence, Fair, Fortezza da Basso.
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.
1995, Rome, Galleria Sauro Bocchi, Arierwiege, 31 May – 30 June.
Vittoria Coen, “Fabio Mauri. Linguaggio e verità”, in Titolo, Year IV, no. 14, Perugia, Winter 1993, p. 42 (ill.).
Marcella Cossu, “Questo quadro è ariano. 1994”, in 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. 270 (ill.).
Percorso vita, Year III, no. 4, Bologna, November 2000–April 2001, 2000, p. 13 (ill.).
