MATERIALS: Artist Book, unique. Oil, pencil and ink on paper
DIMENSIONS: 51 × 35 cm
EDITION: Unique copy
INSCRIPTIONS: Signed on the cover centre ‘Fabio Mauri’
PROVENANCE: The artist
COLLECTION: Fabio Mauri Estate, Rome
CATALOGUE: O_1985_359
A single-copy artist’s book consisting of forty pages painted in oil on straw paper, hand-bound with a soft thread-sewn binding. Introduced by a blank cover and a typographical composition on the title page, the book consists of a sequence of letters that, painted one per page, make up the inscription ‘Entartete Kunst’ (Degenerate Art), the title of the famous exhibition organised by the National Socialist Party in Munich in 1937, and Mauri’s 1985 installation of the same name (inv. 921). The letters’ typographical design echoes the rationalist line of Futura, a modernist typeface employed by both Nazi and opposition propaganda. The artist and his assistant Patrizia Urbani dated and signed the book on the last page.
1989, Florence, Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale di Firenze (Casermetta del Forte Belvedere), Far Libro, opening 19 April.
1991, Gallarate, Civica Galleria d’Arte Moderna, Pagine e dintorni, 22 September – 26 October.
1998, Rome, Art Gallery Banchi Nuovi, Opera-Pensiero, opening 28 April, curated by Gabriele Perretta.
2003, Tourcoing-Lille, Le Fresnoy, Studio national des arts contemporains, Fabio Mauri – L’écran mental, 1 March – 27 April, curated by Dominique Païni.
2005, Cassino (Frosinone), Biblioteca Comunale P. Malatesta, Quarta biennale del libro d’artista, 15 October – 16 November, curated by Mario de Candia, Teresa Pollidori, Barbara Tosi.
2018, New York, Hauser & Wirth, With Out, 25 January – 7 April, curated by Olivier Renaud-Clément.
2023-2024, Rivoli (Turin), Castello di Rivoli Museo d’Arte Contemporanea, Fabio Mauri. Experiments in the Existence of Evil, 16 December 2023 – 24 March 2024, curated by Carolyn Christov-Bakargiev, Sara Codutti, Marianna Vecellio.
Far libro, exhibition catalogue, Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale di Firenze, Florence (Florence: Centro Di Edizioni, 1989), no. 121, p. 111 (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. 217 (ill.).
Fabio Mauri: Male e bellezza – Das Böse und das Schöne, exhibition catalogue, Kunsthalle, Klagenfurt, edited by Arnulf Rohsmann (Klagenfurt, 1997), p. 120 (ill.).
Fabio Mauri. L’écran mental, exhibition catalogue, Le Fresnoy, Studio national des arts contemporains, Tourcoing-Lille, edited by Dominique Païni (Lille, 2003), p. 85 (ill.).
Quarta biennale del libro d’artista città di Cassino, exhibition catalogue, Biblioteca Comunale P. Malatesta, Cassino, edited by Mario de Candia, Teresa Pollidori, Barbara Tosi (Florence: Morgana Edizioni, 2005), n.p.
Fabio Mauri, Scritti in mostra. L’avanguardia come zona 1958-2008, edited by Francesca Alfano Miglietti (Milan: il Saggiatore, 2008), p. 184 (ill.).
Italia Pop: L’arte negli anni del boom, exhibition catalogue, Fondazione Magnani Rocca, Mamiano di Traversetolo (Parma), edited by Walter Guadagnini, Stefano Roffi (Cinisello Balsamo: Silvana Editoriale, 2016), p. 71.
