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Lot Essay
A luminous red silhouette gazes into a sumptuous silver expanse in this elegant and alluring work by the elusive Italian artist Gino de Dominicis. The work is emblematic of the artist’s late period, in which, informed by the ancient beliefs of the Sumerian people, De Dominicis depicted quivering metaphysical forms against vast celestial backgrounds, like the shadows of the gods. Executed in 1997-1998, it is among the final works by the artist, whose oeuvre reveals an enduring obsession with death and immortality. Acquired shortly after its execution by Alessandro Grassi through the Galleria Emilio Mazzoli in Modena, the present work was included in the important exhibition of the Grassi collection at the Centro Pecci, Prato, in 2018.
De Dominicis emerged in the mid-1960s with a singular body of work through which he actively sought to dissociate himself from prevailing art movements of the time, such as Conceptualism and Arte Povera. He cultivated such an enigmatic self-mythology throughout his life that when he passed away—just months after the present work was completed—many believed the announcement was merely another of his existential jokes. Mining ancient and classical texts, De Dominicis looked to forgotten knowledge embedded within mystical, spiritual, and pagan cultures. He was particularly drawn to the figures of Gilgamesh, the fabled Mesopotamian king of Uruk and titular hero of the Epic of Gilgamesh, who unsuccessfully sought immortality from the gods, and Urvasi, an apsara or nymph from the Hindu Vedas, who falls in love with the mortal king Pururavas. The artist’s oeuvre represents a comparable quest for immortality.
In works such as the present, De Dominicis reveals his fascination with the body. Even beyond the late silhouettes, his oeuvre is littered with skeletal forms and ‘invisible sculptures,’ which play with the significance of bodily matter and its relationship to immortality. In the present work, the androgynous, archetypal body emerges like a phantom or shadow: an imprint of the real. In his late work in particular, De Dominicis explored these ideals of immortality through a return to the traditional techniques and timeless splendour of the Italian Renaissance. He turned to the luminous and enduring medium of tempera, a paint bound with egg tempera and steeped with alchemical allusions to new life. In the present work, the figure glows with a radiant red aura, amid a ground of silver leaf that shimmers like a portal to a transcendent, otherworldly realm.
De Dominicis emerged in the mid-1960s with a singular body of work through which he actively sought to dissociate himself from prevailing art movements of the time, such as Conceptualism and Arte Povera. He cultivated such an enigmatic self-mythology throughout his life that when he passed away—just months after the present work was completed—many believed the announcement was merely another of his existential jokes. Mining ancient and classical texts, De Dominicis looked to forgotten knowledge embedded within mystical, spiritual, and pagan cultures. He was particularly drawn to the figures of Gilgamesh, the fabled Mesopotamian king of Uruk and titular hero of the Epic of Gilgamesh, who unsuccessfully sought immortality from the gods, and Urvasi, an apsara or nymph from the Hindu Vedas, who falls in love with the mortal king Pururavas. The artist’s oeuvre represents a comparable quest for immortality.
In works such as the present, De Dominicis reveals his fascination with the body. Even beyond the late silhouettes, his oeuvre is littered with skeletal forms and ‘invisible sculptures,’ which play with the significance of bodily matter and its relationship to immortality. In the present work, the androgynous, archetypal body emerges like a phantom or shadow: an imprint of the real. In his late work in particular, De Dominicis explored these ideals of immortality through a return to the traditional techniques and timeless splendour of the Italian Renaissance. He turned to the luminous and enduring medium of tempera, a paint bound with egg tempera and steeped with alchemical allusions to new life. In the present work, the figure glows with a radiant red aura, amid a ground of silver leaf that shimmers like a portal to a transcendent, otherworldly realm.