Paper on Wood n.4

Paper on Wood n.4 is the final panel in the series and the only one still available: 2011, mixed media on paper mounted on wood, 99 × 69 cm, landscape orientation.

Paper on Wood No. 4: a dark wave full of tags

From the left, a very dark purple mass – almost black – enters the picture, crossing the panel diagonally before breaking into green on the right. The edges are frayed and trail downwards, set against a sand- and ivory-coloured background that remains unoccupied in the bottom left-hand corner. Within the wave, the white tags change their pattern: on the left they run in a horizontal line; in the centre they become vertical and densely packed; and in the top right-hand corner they dissolve into round ‘E’s, like circles.

It looks like wood, but it’s paper

Seeing it in the flesh, anyone would mistake it for a panel made entirely of wood. Yet the surface is actually paper, heat-applied and glued to the wood by a workshop in Bergamo many years ago, with a level of craftsmanship I’d never seen in my entire life. The result is incredibly smooth: to the touch, it feels like a blackboard. It is on this frictionless surface that the white of the tags remains so crisp, even where the lines overlap dozens of times.

The tangle

My style is always the same: a tormented tangle of tags, layered to the point of becoming a texture in which one can only lose oneself. Or, who knows, perhaps find oneself. In my view, to regain clarity and balance, one must first pass through the most chaotic and profound tangle. In this panel, the path is read from top to bottom: chaos above, air below. The green left unobstructed is the breath that follows.

The other three works in the series, the n.1, la n.2 e la n.3, are in private collections. Prices and dimensions of all available works can be found on the original works.

TITLE: Paper on Wood n.4
YEAR: 2011
TECHNIQUE: Mixed media on paper mounted on wood
WIDTH: 99 cm
HEIGHT: 69 cm
THICKNESS: 3 cm
CATALOGUE: POW411
ORIGINAL: Available
PRINTS: Not available