Gianni Dessì Riflessi
13rd November 2003 - 30th January 2004
via Margutta e via della Mercede
Riflessi is Gianni Dessì´s first personal exhibition in Rome since the one held in 1999 at the Associazione Culturale "Volume!", and the third exhibition held in the Galleria Dell´Oca since its re-opening in the spring 2003.
After Siskur by the Roman artist Nunzio, and the exhibition of the early 60´s works of Franco Angeli and Mario Schifano, from November 14th the gallery will be exhibiting an entirely new collection of Dessì´s work purposely created for the Galleria dell´Oca, which includes large paintings, installations and sculptures that the artist has grouped under the name Riflessi.
The third exhibition of the Galleria Dell´ Oca coincides with the opening of a new place in Via Margutta, a perfect addition to the already well known location in Via della Mercede. Dessì´s works embrace both venues.
The exhibition
In Dessì´s own words the exhibition "covers five areas, one for each finger of the hand, the first in via Margutta, the remaining four in Via della Mercede. Five rooms to explore the concepts of painting and space, inside and outside, seeing and viewing, above and below, reflections... and a leitmotiv for everyone: the passion for volumes makes one forget the mathematical sense."
It is a big hand, indeed, that fills the first room in Via Margutta - a hand that points to a yellow spot on the ceiling as if indicating a path, and at the sametime asserting the prominence of the act of viewing. But also leading your eyes towards a "beyond" : to a vision, infact.
The installation goes back to the idea of the cameraepictae that Dessì has already explored on several occasions as places where painting reconfigures space.
In the second room, in Via della Mercede, Dessì has placed a chalk sculpture painted in yellow - a face, (his own portrait ?) - on which he inserts a different an element recalling a different dimension : a black rectangle which, while working against the plasticity of the sculpture opens up to the virtual depth of painting. Were there appears to be a vacuum, your sight seems inevitably to sharpen in the effort of focusing on an "inside", searching for an intelligible sign.
The main element of the third room can be said to be the room itself: four walls, two windows - one of which, being open, conveys in its light the pattern of a stained glass, mounted on the framework. It acts as a boundary between the "inside" and the "outside" of the work. Reflected in the glass are the outlines of the Borromini facade opposite. Around the room are a number of smaller works - Riflessi - where the very act of painting mirrors its own elements.
In the fourth room a large canvas - Studio Giallo - takes up the wall almost in its entirety.
An interior, an impression of depth conveyed by the colors. Two large white elements on the sides (they could be windows or canvases), a table at the centre and on the back wall a picture (perhaps another window?). Where the stained glass in previous room includes and embraces reality as one of its components, Studio Giallo lets the artist´s very own mental space flow into the real room.
The exhibition comes to an end with the two works of the fifth and last room: Stella and Quadro Rosso, in which we can find all the prominent characters of Dessì´s way of painting: overlayed strata of different elements , strokes of color layed with a very physical energy. The sense of space of these works is stretched by cuts in the canvases, and is made more complex by insets of different materials, at times re-arranged by patterns obtained through a more self-possessed use of the brush.
The Author
Gianni Dessì was born in Rome in 1955 where he graduated in Scenography at the Accademia di Belle Arti in 1976. His tutor was Toti Scialoja. Since 1978 he took part in several collective exhibitions. In 1979 he held his first personal exhibition at the Arte Fiera of Bologna through the roman art gallery Ugo Ferranti. He went on to exhibit intensively in Europe and the United States - at the Ugo Ferranti gallery in Rome, Folker Skulima in Berlin, Gianenzo Sperone in Rome, Sperone Westwater in New York, Triebold in Basel and Rheinfelden, Alessandro Bagnai in Siena, Volker Dlehl in Berlin, Gian Ferrari in Milan, Otto in Bologna, Galerie di Meo in Paris. In 1995 a large anthological exhibition of Dessì´s work, curated by Danilo Eccher, was held at the Galleria Civica di Arte Contemporanea of Trento.
Among his recent exhibitions are the one held at the Associazione Culturale "Volume!" in 1999, "Del Dire e del Fare" at the Galleria Bagnai in Siena in 2000, "Legenda" at the Galleria dello Scudo in Verona in 2001.
Dessì´s work for the theatre is also important: in 2002 he designed the scenes for Wagner´s Parsifal, conducted by Claudio Abbado and directed by Peter Stein for the Salzburg Thetre Festival. The production went on to the Edinburgh Festival in the same summer, where Dessì also held a personal exhibition.
Back to top
