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PostWar & Contemporary
3416* ROBERTO CRIPPA(Monza 1921 - 1972 Milan)
Personaggio. 1960.
Cork and mixed media on wood.
Signed and dated on the reverse: R. Crippa
1960.
200 x 200 cm.
We thank the Galleria Pace, Milan, for the
kind support.
Provenance:
- Galleria Schwarz, Milan (verso with the
lable).
- Galleria Annunciata, Milan (verso with the
lable).
- Galleria Schubert, Milan (verso with the
lable).
- Purchased from the above gallery by
the present owner, since then privately
owned Italy.
The Italian artist Roberto Gaetano Crippa
was born in Monza in 1921. Between 1947
and 1948 he attended the “Accademia
di Brera” in Milan. Initially Crippa became
involved with Action Painting. He created
wild spirals, which unfolded within the
space of the canvas. His first exhibition
took place at “Galerie Bergamini” in Milan
around 1947. There he made the ac-
quaintance of Lucio Fontana, who invited
him to join the artist movement “Spazialis-
mo”. In contrast to Fontana, whose artistic
research was directed at overcoming
painting, Crippa’s practice remained within
traditional media.
The canvas remained the medium on
which he experimented, and he accepted
its boundaries. In the 1950s Crippa deve-
loped a montage technique, in which he
brought together various materials such
as tree bark, cork, or iron with nails and
glue, and applied them to the canvas. In
this he was therefore close to his compa-
triot Alberto Burri and the Spaniard Antoni
Tapiès, all three of whom, in the course of
developing from or freeing themselves
from the Informel and Abstract Expressio-
nism, explored the most diverse, ordinary
and everyday materials, and pushed them
to the limits of possibility. The early 1960s
in particular were especially fruitful in this
respect. Crippa took part in the Biennale
in Venice and the Triennale in Milan on
several occasions. In addition, he exhibited
at the first documenta in Kassel in 1955.
The present large format work is a won-
derful example of Crippa’s exploration of
various materials. The size of the work and
also the size of the individual pieces of
cork at first give the impression of sheer
mass, but when one lingers over the piece,
one begins to discern the structure and
form of the cork elements in detail, and the
work loses its initial massive quality.
CHF 30 000 / 35 000
(€ 27 780 / 32 410)