Luciano Bartolini : From Kleenex to ...

Lorenzelli Arte opens Thursday, November 20 at 6:00 p.m. with a large solo show of Luciano Bartolini, to whom the gallery pays tribute displaying almost 30 works of large, medium and little dimension, belonging to different painting cycles, ranging from the 80's to the early 90's. 

The signs that Bartolini utilizes respond to different cultures and eras, released however from geographical and temporal connotations. The artist cites but never reveals the contents of his works; everything is wrapped in an aura of mystery that makes his works magical, intriguing and contemporary. The creative gesture is in the same action of bringing back to life simple and forgotten signs and reconstructing them in a game of references and repetitions that leave open the door of imagination, of the spiritual pathway and of the emotional sphere. 

“Along the trajectory of the parabola of Bartolini, appears a sort of rhythmic imprinting, a tendency for reiteration, division, modulation and measure.(...) All of the symbols and meanings that Bartolini alludes to during his research can be traced back to the same instance: the rhythm (...) Luciano Bartolini tried in every way to rebuild a relationship with the fundamental structures of human beings, with those symbols and those thousand year-old archetypes, which he blends with languages, through quintessentially anti-traditional, contemporary art.”. (The Rhythm of Breathing, by Ivan Quaroni) 

Luciano Bartolini was born in Fiesole July 23, 1948. Since 1971, he has completed many regular visits in the Orient, visiting above all India and Nepal. Between 1973 and 1974, he exhibited his first works with packing paper. In 1974, he began the series of Kleenex, gluing them to each other to form regular patterns. The series is published in the first “artist book”: Soft. In 1975, the cycle of Cartepaglie is born, with handmade cards, primarily using butcher paper, to which he applied layers of very pliable paper. From 1977, gold is utilized by Bartolini and becomes typical and recurrent in his works. He publishes the artist book Traces. He realizes his first installation The Pearl Mosque from which he draws origin for Volevo possedere quello spazio, another installation but one characterized by an angular development; a typical choice of successive exhibitions. In 1980, the cycle of works entitled Asterione is created based on the compositional criterion structured around one or more angles treated as a visual or spiritual “escape.” The same year he is invited to the Venice Biennale. He makes several trips to Greece that will inspire a new cycle linked to the myth of Atlas. In 1982, he publishes the artist book: Looking into the Heart of Light, the Silence. In 1983, he wins a scholarship of the DAAD studio in Berlin and moves to the German capital, where he remained a little more than a year. In 1984, the Nationalgalerie of Berlin dedicated to him an important anthology. The works realized in this period are characterized by an expressive immediacy that until then had remained contained. The simendron, a curved gong typical of the monasteries of Mount Athos, becomes a decorative signature most recurrent in his works. In 1983, he publishes the artist book: Berlinear Raga. In 1986, he realizes a new cycle of works entitled Kosmische Visionen, in which the dominant motive is the development of the iconic vertical. He resumes a theme the successive series of Alberi (1988), Ascensioni (1989) and Foresta Interiore (1989). In 1989 is his first solo show set up at Lorenzelli Arte. In 1990, he exhibits the series Emblematische Blumen, which is characterized from the horizontal development and from concepts of symmetry and golden proportions. In the successive series O sporos (seed) he incorporates a vertical element in the shape of a seed, a typical symbol of the Christian Orthodox tradition. The last cycle of works is that of Soffi di luce realized in 1992: small diptychs that resemble “portable icons” or from characteristic journeys of the Byzantine tradition. In 1993, he holds his last solo show at Lorenzelli Arte. 
Luciano Bartolini passes away in April of 1994.