Giuseppe Capogrossi (1900-1972)

Painted in 1961, Superficie 433 is a minute, but perfectly-formed example of Giuseppe Capogrossi’s celebrated Superficie series. Against a crimson ground, Capogrossi has painted his forked sign, in thick black lines. The Superficie series was begun in 1949 when Capogrossi conclusively turned away from figurative imagery. Embracing an abstracted geometry, he developed what would becoming his signature motif: pronged-shaped images, which have no symbolical or historical resonance, and thus little meaning, but like an alphabet, forms which can be continuously reconfigured. For Capogrossi, sign and structure were inherently linked and fundamental to the creation of a new pictorial language.