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Fired People: Alessandro Pessoli

Past exhibition
September 14 - October 20, 2012
  • Overview
  • Installation Views
  • Works
  • Publications
Overview
Alessandro Pessoli Dragster Burning, 2012 Oil and acrylic on paper 22 1/4 x 21 1/2 inches 22 1/4 x 21 1/2 inches (56.5 x 54.6 cm)
Alessandro Pessoli
Dragster Burning, 2012
Oil and acrylic on paper
22 1/4 x 21 1/2 inches
22 1/4 x 21 1/2 inches
(56.5 x 54.6 cm)

August 10, New York – For his fifth solo show at Anton Kern Gallery, Italian artist Alessandro Pessoli has put together a group of painted ceramic sculptures of varying sizes and scale. Largely figurative and richly colored, often combined with bronze or canvas elements, the work radiates with high saturation and glazed brilliance. The sculptures are arranged in relationship to each other while representing portraits of sorts, individual figures, or, set in box-like constructions, groupings of figures and objects reminiscent of the teatrini (small theaters) known from mid-century Italian artists such as Martini, Melotti, and Fontana. Pessoliʼs illustrious personnel ranges from the Emperor Vespasian to Pier Paolo Pasolini, from Don Quixote and Sancho Panza to Arthur Rimbaud and Paul Verlaine, but also includes Petunia the duck trailed by Chimney Nose and Sandrino the cat. This is Pessoliʼs first show in New York after moving from Milan to Los Angeles, and the influence of the City of Flower and Sunshine is clearly noticeable.

 

Fired People doesn't have a theme; it's an anarchic show, like people meeting in a square without apparent reason. The work is the attempt to find the hidden vitality of imagination by abandoning stylistic coherence and the compactness of a dominant narrative in favor of the freedom to cross from one imagery and aesthetic to another. Working without precise lines of reference empties the figuresʼ rhetoric and produces a sense of nostalgia, somehow mirroring a Western culture that is at its sunset, just the reflex of itself.

 

Known for his fluid and luminous painting technique, as evident in his watercolor drawings, Pessoli transforms the brightly colored ceramic sculptures into extensions of his painted scenes articulated in three-dimensional form. Thereʼs a dynamic balance between the malleable clay and the fluidity of the watercolor-like or airbrushed paint application and sense of coloration. Pessoli combines familiar elements such as the chimney and a range of sexual symbols with new ideas such as the separation of colors into rainbowlike bands, the decorated bronze casts, and mixing such disparate modes of representation as a descriptive and detailed naturalism with child-like abstraction and expressiveness. Yet Pessoliʼs essentially humanist language always speaks with the love for the poetry of the material. This exhibition will coincide with Alessandroʼs solo exhibition at SFMOMA.

Download Press Release
List of Works
Installation Views
  • Installation view of Alessandro Pessoli's fifth solo show at Anton Kern Gallery.
  • Installation view of Alessandro Pessoli's fifth solo show at Anton Kern Gallery. A few works featured.
  • Installation view of Alessandro Pessoli's fifth solo show at Anton Kern Gallery. A few ceramic works.
  • Installation view of Alessandro Pessoli's fifth solo show at Anton Kern Gallery. Ceramic and painted works featured.
  • Installation view of Alessandro Pessoli's fifth solo show at Anton Kern Gallery. The anarchic qualities of the show can be seen here.
  • Installation view of Alessandro Pessoli's fifth solo show at Anton Kern Gallery. A few works shown.
  • Installation view of Alessandro Pessoli's fifth solo show at Anton Kern Gallery. Additional works featured.
  • Installation view of Alessandro Pessoli's fifth solo show at Anton Kern Gallery. More works shown.
  • Installation view of Alessandro Pessoli's fifth solo show at Anton Kern Gallery. Hanging ceramic works.
  • Installation view of Alessandro Pessoli's fifth solo show at Anton Kern Gallery. Detail of relational works.
  • Installation view of Alessandro Pessoli's fifth solo show at Anton Kern Gallery. Another shot of the installation.
  • Installation view of Alessandro Pessoli's fifth solo show at Anton Kern Gallery. View of the back room, featuring multiple works.
Works
  • Alessandro Pessoli Homeless Under Sculpture, 2012
    Alessandro Pessoli
    Homeless Under Sculpture, 2012
  • Alessandro Pessoli Little Elephant, Twins & Cane Soldino, 2012
    Alessandro Pessoli
    Little Elephant, Twins & Cane Soldino, 2012
  • Alessandro Pessoli Nest Head, 2012
    Alessandro Pessoli
    Nest Head, 2012
  • Alessandro Pessoli Paul Verlaine & Arthur Rimbaud, 2012
    Alessandro Pessoli
    Paul Verlaine & Arthur Rimbaud, 2012
  • Alessandro Pessoli Sancho Panza & Don Chiscotte, 2012
    Alessandro Pessoli
    Sancho Panza & Don Chiscotte, 2012
  • Alessandro Pessoli Still Life, 2012
    Alessandro Pessoli
    Still Life, 2012
  • Alessandro Pessoli Teti Roof, 2012
    Alessandro Pessoli
    Teti Roof, 2012
  • Alessandro Pessoli The Bathers, 2012
    Alessandro Pessoli
    The Bathers, 2012
  • Alessandro Pessoli Follow Petunia, 2012
    Alessandro Pessoli
    Follow Petunia, 2012
  • Alessandro Pessoli Unfinished Utopia, 2012
    Alessandro Pessoli
    Unfinished Utopia, 2012
  • Alessandro Pessoli 900, 2012
    Alessandro Pessoli
    900, 2012
  • Alessandro Pessoli Little Atomo Roof, 2012
    Alessandro Pessoli
    Little Atomo Roof, 2012
  • Alessandro Pessoli Blind Man, 2012
    Alessandro Pessoli
    Blind Man, 2012
  • Alessandro Pessoli Tavola Morandi, 2012
    Alessandro Pessoli
    Tavola Morandi, 2012
  • Alessandro Pessoli Chimney Head, 2012
    Alessandro Pessoli
    Chimney Head, 2012
  • Alessandro Pessoli Blue Room, 2012
    Alessandro Pessoli
    Blue Room, 2012
  • Alessandro Pessoli Pasolini Room, 2012
    Alessandro Pessoli
    Pasolini Room, 2012
  • Alessandro Pessoli Red Room, 2012
    Alessandro Pessoli
    Red Room, 2012
  • Alessandro Pessoli Lizard, 2012
    Alessandro Pessoli
    Lizard, 2012
  • Alessandro Pessoli Biker Goose, 2012
    Alessandro Pessoli
    Biker Goose, 2012
  • Alessandro Pessoli One Million Miles from Home, 2012
    Alessandro Pessoli
    One Million Miles from Home, 2012
  • Alessandro Pessoli Big Io, 2012
    Alessandro Pessoli
    Big Io, 2012
  • Alessandro Pessoli Chicken Chopper, 2012
    Alessandro Pessoli
    Chicken Chopper, 2012
  • Alessandro Pessoli Animal Hollywood Sunset, 2012
    Alessandro Pessoli
    Animal Hollywood Sunset, 2012
  • Alessandro Pessoli Dragster, 2012
    Alessandro Pessoli
    Dragster, 2012
  • Alessandro Pessoli Dragster Burning, 2012
    Alessandro Pessoli
    Dragster Burning, 2012
Publications
  • Alessandro Pessoli

    Alessandro Pessoli

    Fired People 2012
    Softcover 84 pages
    Publisher: Anton Kern Gallery
    ISBN: 9780983362241
    Dimensions: 6 x 8.25 inches
    Read more

Related artist

  • Alessandro Pessoli

    Alessandro Pessoli

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