Carretto con cavoli (Carretto siciliano con i funerali di Togliatti)

Details

Renato Guttuso (1912-1987)
Carretto con cavoli (Carretto siciliano con i funerali di Togliatti)
signed 'Guttuso' (lower right)
oil on canvas
56 x 51 3/8 in. (142 x 130.5 cm.)
Painted in 1973

Provenance

Francesco Pellin, Varese, by whom acquired between 1978-1982.
Acquired from the above by the present owner.

Literature

'L'Europeo' vol. 29, no. 24, Milan, 14 June 1973, p. 65 (illustrated).
L. Carluccio, Gazetta del Popolo, Turin, 8 September 1974.
De Micheli, Guttuso, Milan, 1976 (illustrated pl. 11.).
R. Guttuso, Renato Guttuso negli scritti,, Milan, 1976 (illustrated fig. 182).
G. Soavi, Nei luoghi di Guttuso, viaggio in Sicilia, Roma e Velate, Rome, 1979.
G. Guastalla, Omaggio à Renato Guttuso, Livorno, 1982, p. 127 (illustrated).
E. Crispolti, Catalogo ragionato generale dei dipinti di Renato Guttuso, Milan, 1985, no. 73/42 (illustrated p. 186).

Exhibited

Bologna, Studio Murer, Molin di Falcade, Renato Guttuso, 1974, p. 25 (illustrated).
Acqui Terme, Palazzo Liceo Saracco, Renato Guttuso, September 1974, p. 24 (illustrated).
Todi, Palazzo del Popolo, Opere scelte di Renato Guttuso 1964-1975, May - June 1976, p. 48 (illustrated).
Sofia, City Art Gallery, Renato Guttuso, 1976 (illustrated).
Cologne, Kunsthalle, Renato Guttuso, Gemälde und Handzeichnungen, June - July 1977, no. 43, p. 62 (titled `Sizilianischer Karren mit Kohl' with erroneous dimensions).
Stockholm, Moderna Museet, Renato Guttuso, April - May 1978, no. 27 (illustrated p. 7; dated `1972').
Saint-Etienne, Maison de la culture et des loisirs, Guttuso, Peintures, gouaches, dessins, January - February 1979, p. 13 (illustrated).
Molfetta, Sala dei Templari, Renato Guttuso antologica 1938 - 1979, March 1980, no. 17 (illustrated).
Venice, Palazzo Grassi, Guttuso, opere dal 1931 al 1981, April - June 1982, no. 98, (illustrated p. 189).
Palermo, Palazzo Comitini, Guttuso e la Sicilia, Opere dal 1970 ad oggi, April - May 1985.
Milan, Fondazione Antonio Mazzotta, Renato Guttuso, Opere della Fondazione Francesco Pellin, January - March 2005, no. 17; this exhibition later travelled to Rome, Chiostro del Bramante.

Special notice

Artist's Resale Right ("Droit de Suite"). Artist's Resale Right Regulations 2006 apply to this lot, the buyer agrees to pay us an amount equal to the resale royalty provided for in those Regulations, and we undertake to the buyer to pay such amount to the artist's collection agent. All sold and unsold lots marked with a filled square in the catalogue that are not cleared from Christie’s by 5:00 pm on the day of the sale, and all sold and unsold lots not cleared from Christie’s by 5:00 pm on the fifth Friday following the sale, will be removed to the warehouse of ‘Cadogan Tate’. Please note that there will be no charge to purchasers who collect their lots within two weeks of this sale.

Lot Essay

Carretto con canvoli depicts, as the title implies, a Sicilian cart decorated with cauliflower with a scene from the funeral of Palmiro Togliatti. Deceased suddenly in 1964, Togliatti was the leader of the Italian Communist Party and under his leadership, the party became the second largest in the country in 1950s until his death. Renato Guttuso painted the same subject more than once in the same year, including Funeral di Togliatti, the very large work which became one of his most important and well-known, and is currently held in the collection of Museo d’Arte Moderna di Bologna. For Guttuso, the cauliflower is of particular importance and is depicted numerous times in his oeuvre. Franco Grasso writes in 1973 in l’Ora, A Sicilian daily newspaper: “Here is celebrated especially the cauliflower triumph of Sicilian broccoli, the most plebeian , the most vulgar, but the most lush of vegetables”.

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