34 - FRANCO MELLO AND GIORGIO MAFFEI

FRANCO MELLO AND GIORGIO MAFFEI "A Hard Rain's a-Gonna Fall" 2011 25x22 Magazine edited by Giorgio Maffei and Franco Mello; contributions by Francesco Manacordai; graphic design and art direction by Franco Mello. This magazine consists of a selective collection of visual materials dedicated to the relationship between figurative art and other media. It does not feature paintings or sculptures—except in strictly necessary cases, as these are already well known through other sources of information—but is dedicated to printed materials—photographic images, books, catalogs, and ephemera—that not only evoke the atmosphere and context of well-known art events but stand on their own as autonomous artifacts, without any subordination. It exhibits a certain detachment from the written word; in fact, it is not written by art critics, but prioritizes the image of things, leaving to the things themselves the persuasive power to communicate ideas. A magazine that interprets historicized artistic events through the unprecedented and the unusual, while simultaneously seeking to bridge the gap between the arts of the past and the contemporary. This first issue documents the clash, in the late 1960s, between traditional art and the revolution in language, form, materials, and thought. A group of artists, along with a critic, gallery owners, collectors, photographers, and curators, went down in history under the uncomfortable label “Arte Povera”—a brief yet intense moment that changed the course of artistic events. “Art vs. Art”: art against itself, then—a violent acid rain falling on aesthetic conformism. Bob Dylan sang in those years, “A hard rain’s a-gonna fall.” The magazine contains a manifesto by Giuseppe Penone that serves as a dust jacket, specially created for this edition and never previously printed. Inside the dust jacket is a small volume titled “Alfabeto” from 1970 by Penone, printed in an edition of 500 copies: 99 copies signed and numbered by the author, of which 93 are in Arabic numerals and 6 in Roman numerals—for the collaborators. The photographs are by Paolo Mussat Sartor, and the editing and graphic design are by Franco Mello. This copy is number 16/93. Also included is a facsimile of a poster by Michelangelo Pistoletto published on the occasion of the 34th Venice Biennale (on p. 25).