Francesco Lo Savio

Francesco Lo Savio

(Rome, 1935 – Marsille, 1963)

The artist, born in Rome in 1935, has one of the most complex artistic personalities in the history of post-war European art. His entire artistic production can be summarised in three cycles of paintings: 'Spazio-Luce', where he focuses on the energy of pure forms, 'Filtri', where he superimposes pure forms, transforming them into 'corpi di luce', and 'Metalli', in which he uses industrial materials and techniques to occupy physical space. In the middle of his painting career, Francesco Lo Savio starts spatial research experimenting with monochromes with the series Filtri, in which he overlaps layers of tissue papers and cardboards that articulate the plastic rhythm of the painting. In 1960 Francesco Lo Savio takes part in the exhibition 5-pittori, Roma ’60 curated by Pierre Restany at Galleria La Salita in Rome, where he presents the Metalli series: matte black metal plates bent and placed on two-dimensional support. The series Articolazioni totali, presented in 1962; in this works the Metalli are enclosed inside white concrete cubes to isolate them from the external environment that suffocates their intensity. Lo Savio can be seen as precursors of Minimal Art while the most anti-minimal of artistic phenomena exploded: Pop Art. The hostility of the artistic environment, economic problems and depression eventually lead the artist to suicide

Among the most significant exhibtions, we can mention: Documenta IV (Kassel, 1968); Biennale di Venezia (Venice,1968-1972-1986); Progetti per metalli alla galleria La Salita (Rome, 1969); Due decenni di eventi artistici in Italia, Centro per l’Arte Contemporanea Luigi Pecci (Prato,1970);  Identité italienne. L’art en Italie depuis 1959, Centre Pompidou (Paris, 1981); Francesco Lo Savio - Raum-Licht, Kunsthalle Bielefeld (Bielefeld, 1986); The Italian Metamorposhis, 1943-1968, Guggenheim Museum (New York, 1994); Francesco Lo Savio, Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía (Madrid, 2009); Slip of the Tongue, Fondazione Françoise Pinault, (Venice, 2015).