Piero Dorazio — Tornabuoni Art — Exhibition — Slash Paris

Past: April 6 → June 25, 2016

True to its commitment to organize museum-quality exhibitions, Tornabuoni Art will celebrate the return of Piero Dorazio (1927-2005) whose last retrospectives took place at the Musée de Grenoble in 1990 and at the Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris in 1979. Tornabuoni Art will presents a comprehensive overview of the works of the last great painter of the 20th century and one of the fathers of abstraction. The exhibition will be curated by Serge Lemoine.

Piero Dorazio, Arboisier II, 1992 Oil on canvas — 59.1 × 39.4 in Courtesy of the artist & Tornabuoni Art

Steeped in the culture of the School of Paris and influenced by major artists of the New York School such as Willem de Kooning, Franz Kline and Barnett Newman with whom he became friends during his stay in New York in 1953-54, Piero Dorazio introduced large formats and experimented with all the chromatic potential of oil painting.

Piero Dorazio, Nelle ore III, 1975 Oil on canvas — 39.4 × 78.7 in Courtesy of the artist & Tornabuoni Art

Piero Dorazio was a painter but also an art critic, lecturer, curator, and professor. He was also one of the greatest Italian intellectuals of the second half of the 20th century. He is an essential artist going against the tide of the avant-garde of his time, who questions the place of painting and the evolution of abstraction.

Piero Dorazio, Ombra lunga I°, 2003 Oil on canvas — 31.9 × 39.4 in Courtesy Tornabuoni Art

Piero Dorazio is a painter of colour and light, whose movement he was also attempting to convey. He resorted to uniform repetitions of coloured grids placed and overlaid at regular intervals. The structure of the work is created through this colourful web, more or less thin, broad or tight.

Abstract and international, Piero Dorazio was quickly recognized by the art world, not only in his own country 
but also throughout Europe and even in the United States where he lived and took an active part in the New York artistic scene.