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Lot Essay
.... the discovery of the cosmos is a new dimension, it is infinity, so I make a hole in this canvas, which was at the basis of all the arts a.d I have created an infinite dimension... the idea is precisely that, .t is a new dimension corresponding to the cosmos... The hole is, precisely, creating this void behind there… Einstein's discovery of the cosmos is the infinite dimension, without end. And so here we have: foreground, middleground and background... to go farther what do I have to do?... I make holes, infinity passes through them, light passes through them, there is no need to paint' (quoted in Enrico Crispolti, 'Spatialism and Informel. The Fifties', pp.144-150 in Lucio Fontana, Milan.1998, p.146).
It was in 1958 that Lucio Fontana's hole paintings, coloured canvases with holes gouged out, developed into the Attese ('Expectations') series, so named because instead of the crude hole viewers had come to expect of Fontana came a refined and elegant slash made with a razor blade. This new method lacked the brutality of the holes - the gesture itself, and the viewer's awareness of that gesture, were integral to Fontana's works, emphasising the moment of creation, the rupture of the limited dimensional existence inherent in the canvas, a relic of a past expressly confronted by Fontana's Spatialist Movement. The very act of cutting the canvas reflects the unorthodox iconoclasm of the Spatialists, emphasising the canvas' perishability, opening it up to the possibility of new forms - and dimensions - of art no longer reliant on antiquated media rendered irrelevant by the Space Age. Fontana's followers in Buenos Aires had written in their Manifesto Blanco, the precursor to Spatialism: 'We live in the mechanical age. Painted canvas and upright plaster no longer have a reason to exist' (from The Manifesto Blanco, written by B. Arias, H. Cazeneuve, M. Fridman, Buenos Aires, 1946).
When Concetto spaziale, Attese ('Spatial Concept, Expectations') was executed in 1960-61, Fontana was refining the slashing technique he had been developing. In earlier works the cuts tended to be small, arranged like lines of writing. However, as Fontana further explored his new theme, he began to lend each individual slash greater importance, focussing on new, sparser groupings and therefore new rhythms within each work. In Concetto spaziale, Attese, the staccato of his earlier works has given way to a more emphatic manner, each swooping cut underlined by the contrast between the black canvas and the infinity visible through its holes.
It was in 1958 that Lucio Fontana's hole paintings, coloured canvases with holes gouged out, developed into the Attese ('Expectations') series, so named because instead of the crude hole viewers had come to expect of Fontana came a refined and elegant slash made with a razor blade. This new method lacked the brutality of the holes - the gesture itself, and the viewer's awareness of that gesture, were integral to Fontana's works, emphasising the moment of creation, the rupture of the limited dimensional existence inherent in the canvas, a relic of a past expressly confronted by Fontana's Spatialist Movement. The very act of cutting the canvas reflects the unorthodox iconoclasm of the Spatialists, emphasising the canvas' perishability, opening it up to the possibility of new forms - and dimensions - of art no longer reliant on antiquated media rendered irrelevant by the Space Age. Fontana's followers in Buenos Aires had written in their Manifesto Blanco, the precursor to Spatialism: 'We live in the mechanical age. Painted canvas and upright plaster no longer have a reason to exist' (from The Manifesto Blanco, written by B. Arias, H. Cazeneuve, M. Fridman, Buenos Aires, 1946).
When Concetto spaziale, Attese ('Spatial Concept, Expectations') was executed in 1960-61, Fontana was refining the slashing technique he had been developing. In earlier works the cuts tended to be small, arranged like lines of writing. However, as Fontana further explored his new theme, he began to lend each individual slash greater importance, focussing on new, sparser groupings and therefore new rhythms within each work. In Concetto spaziale, Attese, the staccato of his earlier works has given way to a more emphatic manner, each swooping cut underlined by the contrast between the black canvas and the infinity visible through its holes.