Gli Arlecchini
The artwork Gli Arlecchini is part of my research on illustrated art books of the last century. In this case, the book is Paul Klee. Figures and Faces (Thames and Hudson, London, 1978). I selected six faces, which I enlarged and reproduced through photoceramics on extremely thin surfaces (3 mm), made during a residence in Montelupo Fiorentino (Florence), well-known for ancient ceramic tradition. During the residence, which coincided with Carnival period, I became aware of some typical seventeenth-century decorations called “Arlecchini”, caricatured representations of popular personalities of the time. Apparently, my Arlecchini may look like paper masks, like the ones that children cut out while playing dress-up. The faces traced by Klee acquire different expressions due to the mismatch of eyes and mouth with the holes shaped on the model of the classic beauty mask. The artwork is made up of six masks of different size, which are hung on the wall with a variable distance, through little custom-made brass cylinders in correspondence with the holes for the eyes.
Gli Arlecchini, 2019, Ceramic, photo ceramic transfer, brass, variable dimensions, the average size of the masks is 30x21x0.3cm.
