MATERIALS: Wood-burning cooker, iron frame, bottles, newspapers, pots, electric switchboard, knife, wood
DIMENSIONS: Approx. 250 × 192 × 60 cm
Kitchen: 78 × 105 × 58 cm
Frame: 162 × 192 × 7 cm
PROVENANCE: The artist
COLLECTION: Fabio Mauri Estate, Rome
CATALOGUE: O_1990_559
On a wood-burning cooker, two field pots stacked one inside the other hold three glass bottles wrapped in pages from German newspapers. A knife is concealed under a lid on the cast-iron griddle near the pots and pans; a fourth bottle rests by a sculptural wooden block. The kitchen was installed against a wall of which a metal frame frames a portion, dividing it into two halves within which a pan and an industrial electrical switch are arranged. Hidden inside the wood- burning stove, a gas stove heats the water contained in the large pot, producing steam: a metaphor for the long-standing ‘German Question’ continuing to simmer. The work’s title recalled the performance Che cosa è la filosofia. Heidegger e la questione tedesca (inv. 3396). It was part of the 1990 ‘Interno/Esterno’ exhibition-installation (inv. 3760) and later, in 1997, of an installation of works devoted to Germany during the early years of reunification (inv. 2289).
1990, Rome, Galleria Anna D’Ascanio, Fabio Mauri: Interno, 9 March – 21 April.
1990, Florence, Galleria Carini, Fabio Mauri: Interno / Esterno, 19 May – July (travelling: 1990, Rome).
1992, Rome, Palazzo dei Congressi, Arteroma ’92: Wunderkammer, 26–30 March.
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.
1997-1998, Rome, Macro – Galleria Comunale d’Arte Moderna e Contemporanea, Arte contemporanea: Lavori in corso 2, 17 December 1997 – 10 March 1998, curated by Giovanna Bonasegale.
2012, Milan, Palazzo Reale, Fabio Mauri – The End, 19 June – 23 September, curated by Francesca Alfano Miglietti.
2017, São Paulo, Bergamin & Gomide Gallery, Fabio Mauri: Senza Arte, 11 March – 29 April.
2018, New York, Hauser & Wirth, With Out, 25 January – 7 April, curated by Olivier Renaud-Clément.
Carolyn Christov-Bakargiev, “Fabio Mauri. Una mostra di cose autentiche che non lascia spazio al visitatore”, in Flash Art, Year XXIII, no. 156, Giancarlo Politi Editore, Milan, June–July 1990, p. 153 (ill.).
Fabio Mauri. Interno / Esterno, exhibition catalogue, Galleria Anna D’Ascanio, Rome and Galleria Carini, Florence, edited by Lara-Vinca Masini, Alberto Boatto (Rome / Florence, 1990), p. 47 (ill.).
Francesca Alfano Miglietti, Arte Pericolosa (Milan: Prearo Editore, 1991), p. 99 (ill.).
Arte contemporanea: Lavori in corso 2, exhibition catalogue, Macro – Galleria Comunale d’Arte Moderna e Contemporanea, Rome, edited by Giovanna Bonasegale (Rome: Edizioni De Luca, 1997), p. 41 (ill.).
Fabio Mauri. The End, exhibition catalogue, Palazzo Reale, Milan, edited by Francesca Alfano Miglietti (Milan: Skira, 2012), p. 141 (ill.).
Lea Mattarella, “La storia come tragedia”, in Arte, no. 467, Milan, July 2012, p. 82 (ill.).
Mauri, edited by Flaminio Gualdoni (Milan: Corriere della Sera, 2022), pp. 64–65 (ill.).
