Sotto le stelle (Sculptor), 2020

A medal holder with gilt hooks features the reproduction of a male face by Lorenzo Bartolini, surrounded by the fragments of a star chart. Placed on the top edge of the frame is a gilt card-stock diadem, while a fragment of the star chart, applied to the glass of the medal holder, emphasizes the name of the constellation “Sculptor”.
The diadem – the attribute of dignity and virtue – ideally encircles the Neoclassical face, which is called to evoke the idea of sculpture itself. As the title tells us, the work pays homage to the practice of sculpting via a symbolic nocturnal time setting.
The work is part of a series of thirteen variants, made between 1985 and 2025, which are distinguished by the presence of one or more medal holders, their dimensions, and, above all, the intervention that is associated with them (GPO-0556, GPO-0563, GPO-0594, GPO-0595, GPO-0606, GPO-0615, GPO-0632, GPO-0717, GPO-0718, GPO-0891, GPO-1096, GPO-1099, GPO-1182). Akin to the GPO-0717, GPO-1099 and GPO-1182 versions, the work does not include a nebula of gilt nails scattered around the medal holder.