Ultimo modello, 1992

Ultimo modello is a work that over the course of time has by its very definition undergone continuous revisions. At first (1992) it consisted of a plexiglas structure with a square base featuring drawings carved in black on the five sides that made it look like the model of a room. Cut into the outer walls were several openings – an entrance door on one side and two doors on each of the other three sides – while the bottom surface resembled a chequered floor. Later, the structure was integrated (1995) and then replaced (1999) by a second plexiglas element, made up of two orthogonal dividers that intersected at the centre, and materialized the crosspiece of the median axes of the first structure. The lower side of this second element was carved, like the first, with a drawing of the floor, while the two dividers featured a black drawing for the doors and a dry engraving for the diagonals. In the area corresponding to the centre there is a small cut-out square in the dividers, coinciding with the position of a hypothetical painting hanging at the centre between the two doors.
Each time Ultimo modello has been presented it has been updated – the word “ultimo” (latest) is used in the sense of “inedito” (brand new) – often dictated by the materials of the other works on display or by the exhibition design.
The “diary” of Ultimo modello includes the following events in this order:
October 1992, Galleria Christian Stein, Milan. In its first apparition, the “room” hosts a primed canvas (it is identical to the canvases of the other works on display) and a crumpled black and white reproduction of Disegno geometrico (1960, GPO-0001). For the purposes of the exhibition design, which is centred around a large metal construction based on the multiplication of the squaring of Disegno geometrico and understood to be the materialization of that virtual container of countless works, Ultimo modello is situated at the top, on the apex of the metal structure.
November 1992, Galerie Yvon Lambert, Paris. With respect to the presentation in Milan, the "room" contains a plexiglas sheet (material that was used for almost all the works displayed) and the torn fragments of a reproduction of Disegno geometrico. Since the exhibition repeats the same layout as the one presented in Milan during the same period, in this case as well Ultimo modello is installed in the metal structure, but this time in the central area.
January 1995, Marian Goodman Gallery, New York. Added to the original "room" was another plexiglas structure in the shape of a crosspiece. The first one was placed on the ground and contained crumpled acetate film featuring an impression of some planets; the second one was placed on a plexiglas plinth so that the void where the crosspiece intersected coincided with the intersection of the two steel cables stretched along the diagonals of the room.
June 1995, Palazzo della Ragione, Padua. In the exhibition installation located at the centre of the Salone del Palazzo della Ragione the cross-shaped structure hangs down from the ceiling on a steel cable so that it wavers in mid-air; its empty cut-out square in the middle of the cross-shaped structure is crossed by a laser beam. The other structure is instead integrated in the assemblage of the various elements set up on the ground and doubled with a second identical structure: one stands up straight, the other one is turned on its side; both of them are associated with a primed canvas (belonging to the work Essere o non essere (GPO-0757) and a black men's shoe.
May 1999, Galleria Civica d’Arte Moderna e Contemporanea, Turin. From now on, Ultimo modello consists solely of the cross-shaped structure, installed inside a plexiglas case on a white plinth. Inside the cut-out square is a small canvas, while countless other canvases of the same size are scattered on the chequerboard of the floor.
March 2000, Galerie Yvon Lambert, Paris. In the area of the two cut-out squares in the middle of the cross-shaped structure is a crumpled colour photograph of the entrance room of the artist's home (the same room that was reproduced in the original plexiglas model).
April 2005, Kunstmuseum Winterthur, Winterthur. Like in Turin in 1999, stuck in the cut-out square in the middle of the cross-shaped structure is a small canvas, while scattered across the chequerboard of the floor are several details of photographic reproductions taken from the artist's repertoire (orbital drawings, skies, the artist's hand as it is about to intervene, the desk in his studio, etc.), along with small and square transparent or reflecting plexiglas units.