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Lot Essay
'Painting, for me, depends on color, which takes me further and further away from real form. The emotion that colors awake in me, that is to say the contrast of one colour with another, or their relationship, stimulates my imagination much more than does the materialization of the human figure if I have to rely on pictorial means alone' (Marino Marini, 'Thoughts of Marino Marini', pp.5-11, G. di San Lazzaro, ed., Homage to Marino Marini, New York, p.6).
Imbued with a great stillness and mystery, Bagliori nella foresta ('Bright Lights in the Forest'), is one of the largest of Marini's paintings, and an absorbing rendition of his most favored theme, man and his mount. To Marini, the horse and rider symbolised a bond between man and nature, although many of his works on this theme express his angst at Modernity's rupture of this bond.
When Marini executed Bagliori nella foresta in 1958 his painting had truly reached its apogee, as the bold manipulation of paint and palette in this work illustrates. From the late 1940s onwards, Marini's pictorial works had increased in confidence, exemplified by his use in Bagliori nella foresta of blocks of colour to capture the light and its various reflections. This patchwork effect represents a stylistic departure for Marini and is a product of Marini's increasing fixation with colour. He has essentially sculpted the two-dimensional image out of a brick-like arrangement of contrasting colours. The interplay between each of the monochrome patches creates a sense of volume, while also accentuating the light and its various reflections. The very surface of Marini's Bagliori nella foresta lends a sculptural feel to this atmospheric painting, his use of impasto 'incrustations' accentuating the painterly mosaic, especially in the 'bright lights' where the stabs of colour seem to shimmer in the forest's darkness. Significantly, Marini here abandoned the subdued earth tones that he had favoured in his earlier works which were reminiscent of ancient Etruscan wall-painting, and has replaced them with vivid blues and ardent yellows whose intensity accentuates the brooding chiaroscuro of this work.
The patchwork method is especially pertinent in Bagliori nella foresta, where Marini's manipulation of colour blends the horse and rider with the background, the man and his mount becoming a part of the forest. The innovation of Marini's paintings reflects a confidence made apparent by the large scale of his works from this period - Bagliori nella foresta is one of the largest paintings Marini ever painted, and like his other paintings executed on a similar scale, which all date from the same period, reflects Marini's desire to enshrine colours and their interplay in a monumental format.
Imbued with a great stillness and mystery, Bagliori nella foresta ('Bright Lights in the Forest'), is one of the largest of Marini's paintings, and an absorbing rendition of his most favored theme, man and his mount. To Marini, the horse and rider symbolised a bond between man and nature, although many of his works on this theme express his angst at Modernity's rupture of this bond.
When Marini executed Bagliori nella foresta in 1958 his painting had truly reached its apogee, as the bold manipulation of paint and palette in this work illustrates. From the late 1940s onwards, Marini's pictorial works had increased in confidence, exemplified by his use in Bagliori nella foresta of blocks of colour to capture the light and its various reflections. This patchwork effect represents a stylistic departure for Marini and is a product of Marini's increasing fixation with colour. He has essentially sculpted the two-dimensional image out of a brick-like arrangement of contrasting colours. The interplay between each of the monochrome patches creates a sense of volume, while also accentuating the light and its various reflections. The very surface of Marini's Bagliori nella foresta lends a sculptural feel to this atmospheric painting, his use of impasto 'incrustations' accentuating the painterly mosaic, especially in the 'bright lights' where the stabs of colour seem to shimmer in the forest's darkness. Significantly, Marini here abandoned the subdued earth tones that he had favoured in his earlier works which were reminiscent of ancient Etruscan wall-painting, and has replaced them with vivid blues and ardent yellows whose intensity accentuates the brooding chiaroscuro of this work.
The patchwork method is especially pertinent in Bagliori nella foresta, where Marini's manipulation of colour blends the horse and rider with the background, the man and his mount becoming a part of the forest. The innovation of Marini's paintings reflects a confidence made apparent by the large scale of his works from this period - Bagliori nella foresta is one of the largest paintings Marini ever painted, and like his other paintings executed on a similar scale, which all date from the same period, reflects Marini's desire to enshrine colours and their interplay in a monumental format.