Yellow Flowers, Trapped Birds, Brown Cross, 25-29 February 1972

In 1947, 31-year-old Zinelli was released from military service, diagnosed with schizophrenia, and committed to a hospital in Verona. A decade later he began drawing, developing and evolving a distinctive, graphic style championed by artist Jean Dubuffet, among others. Works from the last few years of Zinelli’s life are rendered in fine lines and vibrant colors, and his imagery included vignettes of men, animals and symbols in fanciful combinations and nonrealistic scales. Here, a giant sunflower towers over figures and buildings, while in the center of the page a trotting bird dwarfs the adjacent human form. Crosses are scattered throughout the composition, from a large, bold one in the top right, to rosaries and church-like architectural details on the left.