Fui, Sarò, Non Sono

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Quite by chance I found myself in Golden Square. I’d arrived early for lunch and rather than sit in the restaurant alone I walked around the block to pass the time. I should have known about the Marian Goodman Gallery, but it was a great surprise. It’s usually closed on a Sunday but they had opened specially because of Frieze London with a fantastic exhibition by Giuseppe Penone. The large piece on the wall was made of acacia thorns, like iron filings magnetised into the shape of a fossil leaf, or now that I look again perhaps it’s a pair of giant lips.

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Propagazione
Ink, parchment, canvas

In another room there was a huge drawing filling an entire wall. Concentric rings like the cross section of an enormous tree, expanding outwards from a single thumbprint.

It is a model of propagation that you see in a tree when you cut a section in the wood, but which is also present in sound and water. It is a shape that is integral to the universe, that starts with a single fingerprint, but is representative of the whole.

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Gli anni dell’albero più uno
boxwood, wax

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Gli anni dell’albero più uno
typographic ink and pencil on paper

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Tree years plus one

A branch wrapped in wax fingerprints, traces of the human hand,
holding, caressing, adding a final touch to the layers of tree rings.

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Ombra di Terra
bronze and terracotta

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Branches cast in bronze holding what seem to be roof tiles,
formed into rippled strata of an enlarged thumbprint.

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Respirare l’ombra
wire mesh, laurel leaves, bronze, terracotta

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40 cages of laurel leaves, caught breathing the shadow of an amputated bronchial branch.

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Dafne
bronze

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These are works made by hand; shadows of trees cast by hand of shadows cast by trees.

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Indistinti confini
marble, bronze

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This was a wonderful exhibition.
I’m so glad I stumbled upon it.
Giuseppe Penone is a force of nature.

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Fui, Sarò, Non Sono (I was, I will be, I am not)

Frames of reference

2 thoughts on “Fui, Sarò, Non Sono”

  1. Beautiful.
    I entrust to the work the present of my existence.
    I entrust to the work the past of my existence.
    I entrust to the work the future of my existence.

    That, it seems to me, is a very fine way to describe the value of work well and thoughtfully done.

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