Page 60 - Studio International - February 1967

series this white space is invariably populated with whether—or to what extent—the hidden materials
miniscule, characteristically secretive images dis- have any inherent value as radicals of an aesthetic.
persed in arrangements the reasons for which are To what extent does the painting as surface, the
not immediately obvious. In the `Multiverse of the canvas as art object, the object as poetic fact, rely
Young Shandy' series of 1965-6, the images had upon the validity of the notions that make up its
primarily to do with more or less decodable refer- substructure ? Since Simonetti's paintings are based
ences, either literary or pictorial; in the current upon the concept of a culture, can they be criti-
series, Tel(l)-quel(le), the individual signs are more cized by criticizing the concept of culture that they
abstract. They become iconographic rather than materialize ?
The paintings of referential. Simonetti himself says that the differ- His concepts of space, time, technology, power,
ence is between Sprache and Scheinsprache. This and historical development may or may not be
Gianni Emilio alone would indicate that, in both cases, the nature true or exact. But the canvases will not grow or di-
of the signs is of less importance than the relation- minish on the basis of such verification or the lack
Simonetti ships in which they are disposed. The first series is of it. What matters is the apparent coherence of all
concerned with the collocation of references to the this hypothetical mental fact, and the attempt to
kind of order that interests Simonetti (references to organize it into the format of a painting. This in
Joyce, Sterne, Cage, Happenings, Dada, Pop, etc.) itself constitutes a kind of pictorial metaphor, and
If art exists in relationship to the world, today we and with arranging these references within a kind the paintings are to be judged only in terms of the
can no longer talk of art without talking of science of order modelled upon the order they seem to rigour with which this metaphor is realized.
and scientific linguistics, in the same way that license—the order inherent in the references. For The canvas' declaration of its own complexity—
Vasari could not talk about art without talking Simonetti this order is a matter of a universe the disposition of the pictorial elements in such a
about God. Our task, in the name of our sal- (`multiverse', to use his word) in which, again way as to clearly indicate their concern with
vation, has become to discover the ways in which according to Palazzoli, the principle of association meanings, with readings—is in itself part of a style.
we think, or will think, in this brave new world. has replaced the law of cause and effect, stasis has And it is this style rather than what is actually indi-
One artist explicitly involved with this revolu- been replaced by process, sequence by simultaneity, cated by the signs themselves that becomes signifi-
tionary research is Gianni Emilio Simonetti, a discursive narrative by instantaneous and total cant. To make reference to the existence of other
young Italian painter who lives and works in representation, logic by illogicality, and sense by worlds or logical orders than those we are accustomed
Milan.* Like Baruchello and Fahlstrom, Simonetti nonsense. (Nexus non sense is the title of one of his to see and experience is to express the conviction
at present works in a large neutral white space, and paintings.) The Tel(l)-quel(le) series continues to that those worlds exist and are approachable and
notwithstanding the extremely different kinds and attempt to work with the same logical structure, habitable. These paintings belong to a genre that is
classes of objects these three painters put into this but it no longer feels the need for support and a corollary to the literary Utopia. It is not by
space, they are alike in so far as its use is concerned, corroboration from sources extraneous to the for- accident that the Utopia and its inversion, the anti-
and in so far as this particular kind of space has mal structure of the canvas itself. The objects in Utopia, traditionally went under the guise of a
any inherent metaphorical significance. these canvases are sui generis constructions of travel book— a report on a real world experienced
The space itself is evidence of the kind of search imaginary machines and geometric forms that be- by a journalistic eye. It is likewise no accident that
in which Simonetti is involved, of the epistemo- have according to laws other than those of Euclid Simonetti presents a logic that appears to be a real
logical order within which his painting is con- and Archimedes. The projection of a square might logic, a real report on the mental physiognomy of a
ceived. This space has nothing to do with the very well become a circle; a cutting machine might region contiguous with the regions of the physical
traditional 'window on the world' (a concept not augment, rather than reduce, the object being and logical relationships we daily perceive. By
only traditional, but Surrealist as well, and in a sheared. The paintings reveal a conviction that the elaborating his proofs of the existence of this order
sense Abstract Expressionist when Abstract Expres- reconstruction of the world's logical structures is he makes his convictions convincing and gives his
sionist canvases are considered from the point of necessary; they present themselves as evidence that declarations the power to attract and hold the at-
view of gestural result) ; nor does it have to do with such a reconstruction is possible. The laws accord- tention and mental engagement of the viewer.
the isolation-booth space of Andy Warhol's single- ing to which Simonetti's objects seem to work This mental engagement is precisely what
image canvases or Lowell Nesbitt's flowers and might very well be considered analogous to the Simonetti wants. By engaging the viewer's mind
bicycles (the laboratory-type space of George laws incorporated into Duchamp's 'playful physics' he hopes the canvas will influence it, replacing
Brecht's constructions on cotton—the kind of space —which according to Duchamp explain the extra- one group of mental attitudes with another, and
that surrounds all Duchamp's Ready-mades, space ordinary phenomena at work in The Bride Stripped ampler group. q
conceived of as the absolute lack of interference so Bare by Her Bachelors, Even. *Simonetti's new paintings are being exhibited at the
as to allow the image to make the maximum Having stated that Simonetti's paintings are Galleria Schwarz, Milan, this February.
possible number of reverberations). This space analogous to the 'Large Glass' both in logical
begins as a Cartesian tabula rasa (as Daniela structure and in the mode in which they present
Palazzoli has pointed out), a working area where themselves as surfaces (an assembly of disparate or Facing page
problems are formulated and solutions outlined— a arcanely-related elements disposed across a surface Gianni Emilio Simonetti
Top left
space that signifies a zero level of presuppositions according to visual, psychological and epistemo-
Ubi filia pater cessat 1966
and a cancelling out of all previous formulations. logical principles that are anything but immediately
Mixed media
And from here, by placing predetermined objects apprehensible), it is not surprising that the diffi- 27+x 271 in.
within it, Simonetti turns it into a representation culty of understanding them is much the same as From the series Tel (I)-quel(le)
of the infinitely extended co-ordinates within the difficulty of understanding 'Large Glass'. One
Top right
which cerebrality happens. Each of these canvases must decide about the relationship between the
Ready-game table 1966
is the representation of an intellectual operation, a concrete, tangible surface and the hidden material
Mixed media
description and a concretization of Simonetti's con- that lies beneath it. Is the surface as such sufficient? 19 5/8 x 19 5/8 in.
cept of that new logic which is to replace the old Or is the painting misunderstood until it has been From the series Tel (I)-guel(le)
and the present. subjected to exegesis, until all its arcane principles
Right
Apart from what these canvases may be, what does have been clarified? Or is there some intermediate
Pingsh 1966
one see in them? That depends on the particular level of dialogue between the two elements that 15 3/4 x 19 5/8 in.
series of paintings. But in the two most recent will explain both? This is tantamount to asking From the series The Multiverse of the Young Shandy