Luciano Fontana, I Teatrini or ‘Little Theatres’ catalogued this rarely seen series of works. Now shown for the first time outside Italy by Nahmad Projects. Widely known for his slashed canvasses, these works from the mid 1960s capture space by encasing perforated canvases within lacquered wooden frames, themselves shaped into organic forms reminiscent of trees and clouds. Lucio Fontana considered this series the culmination of his ‘Spatial Concepts’ – artworks designed to affect the viewer’s perception of space within the work and beyond. I Teatrini also contain playful allusions to space and the first spacewalk (1965) embedded in punctures walking across canvas like footsteps in the sky.
We wanted to make our book into a Teatrini. What started out as a simple idea grew into reality as we worked out how best to reflect the works and the high gloss lacquer of the frames whilst keeping the canvasses within as perforated canvasses.
We did this by creating layers of varnish and lacquer on the cover and using brass dies to create a third dimension from the otherwise flat material. Further brass dies created the punching effect of the work on the ‘canvas’ before we completed the effect by painting the edges of the book black.
Inside we kept the book simple, following and illustrating the work as a viewer might when walking around the show. Beautiful, uncoated paper and bright, clear colour.
– Quantity: 250
– Format: 287 x 245mm portrait, 96pp text plus 4pp cover.
– Text paper 150gsm Munken Pure Rough
– Four colour process throughout. No seals, coats of varnishes applied to the work.
– Printed offset lithography
– Produced by Hurtwood.
