Gino De Dominicis
(Ancona, 1947 - Rome, 1998)
Gino De Dominicis studied at a state art institute and took architecture courses at the Fine Arts Academy in Rome. Under the influence of Edgardo Mannucci (1904–1986), De Dominicis developed his artistic style, working with various media including sculpture, painting, film, and installation. Although he hated the word “Conceptual,” his early works from the late 1960s and early 1970s are widely described as Conceptual or Neo-Conceptual. De Dominicis, however, preferred the term Modern Romanticism. At his first solo exhibition in 1969, the artist included an obituary poster announcing, and also predicting, his death. Throughout his career, De Dominicis developed a deep interest in ancient Sumerian and Babylonian Assyrian literature. From this old culture, he got the inspiration for most of his artworks, such as Urvasi e Gilgamesh. Even though he was extremely interested in immortality, his work also displays ideas of mortality, as seen in his sculptures of skeletons, including the colossal 28-meter work Calamita Cosmica, which he had left behind before his death. De Dominicis is also known for his controversial works, the most notorious being Second Resolution of Immortality (The Universe is Still) (1972). The installation, involving a boy with down syndrome, was shut down after only a few hours on display at the opening of the Venice Biennale. He participated in several other Biennals in Paris (1971 and 1973) and Venice (1980, 1990, 1995, and 1997). In later years, De Dominicis drew sketches of figures with elongated and surreal features. In the final years of his career, he took up portraiture. He was known to fabricate facts about himself to keep an air of mystery to his name, to the point that, when he died in 1998, people who knew him thought it was another wild rumor he had invented.
Among his solo exhibitions, we can mention: Gino De Dominicis (Galleria D, Ancona, 1967); Lo Zodiaco (Galleria L’Attico, Rome, 1970); Gino De Dominicis (Galleria Toselli, Milan, 1970); Gino De Dominicis augura a tutti l’immortalità del corpo (Galleria L’Attico, Rome, 1971); Quando non si parla più d’immortalità del corpo, ingresso riservato agli animali (Galleria Lucrezia de Domizio, Pescara, 1975); 11 statue di G. De Dominicis (Galleria Pieroni, Rome, 1979); Urvasi e Gilgamesh (Galleria Pio Monti, Rome, 1980); Gino De Dominicis (Galleria Mario Pieroni, Roma, 1983); Gino De Dominicis (Galleria d’arte contemporanea Emilio Mazzoli, Modena, 1986); De Dominicis Museo Nazionale di Capodimonte, Naples, 1986); Some more or less recent works by Gino De Dominicis (The Murray and Isabella Rayburn Foundation, New York, 1989-1990); Quelques oeuvres plus ou moins recentes (Centre National d’Art Contemporaine Le Magasin, Grenoble, 1990); La misura italiana (Erica Ravenna, Rome, 1992); De Dominicis (Galleria Toselli, Milan, 1995); Alcune opere più o meno recenti (Galleria Severi Arte, Bologna, 1996); Premio Camera dei Deputati (Palazzo di Montecitorio, Rome, 1997); Ricordo di Gino De Dominicis (GNAM - Galleria Nazionale d’Arte Moderna e Contemporanea, Rome, 1999); Antologica 1970-1995 (Poleschi Arte, Milan, 2001); Calamita cosmica (Mole Vanvitelliana, Ancona, 2005); Gino De Dominicis (Centre National d’Art Contemporain de La villa Arson, Nice, 2007); Gino De Dominicis (galerie Rudiger Schottle, Munich, 2009); L'immortale (MAXXI - Museo Nazionale delle Arti del XXI secolo, Rome, 2010).
