Milan, at the Gate 44 printworks the solo exhibition Ecolalia by abstract artist Giulio Zanet

From Nov. 30 to Dec. 19, the Supergiovane young artist promotion project presents a solo exhibition by Giulio Zanet (Colloeretto Castelnuovo, 1984), titled Ecolalia, at the Gate 44 art print shop. The exhibition consists of a series of new large-scale abstract pictorial works, created by the artist on mixed media vinyl fabric, and a multiple on paper produced in collaboration with the space. The exhibition, curated by Daniele Capra, is accompanied by a publication with images of the works the curator’s text.

The Treccani dictionary defines echolalia as “the habit of repeating, while speaking, one or more words in the sentence.” The word is also used in psychiatry to describe the “speech disorder consisting of the automatic repetition of words or phrases heard at the moment,” a condition typically found in those in demented, catatonic or hysterical states. In Zanet’s practice, Echolalia tells instead of the artist’s tendency to conceive of painting as a processual repetition of similar gestures, of almost identical technical acts and procedures. Those of the artist are in fact images that arise from a constant practice in the studio, in a repeated mode, not necessarily conscious, that is carried out as a choreutic action. Zanet, in confronting the surface, not only moves the work rhythmically, but moves himself by repeating postures and syntax as in a rhapsodic dance.

Ecolalia collects five aniconic works made on an unusual support (a monochrome vinyl-based, shiny and iridescent technical fabric) on which the artist has intervened with oil pastel and spray. These are dry and essential works, in which the surface is dominated by the playful pleasure of writing, which manifests itself in forms that at first glance are reminiscent of doodles or the attempts made when, at the stationery store, one tries out markers never used before. But, contrary to what happens in those situations, the forms elaborated by the artist are closed, finished, circumstantial and perfectly determined, even in the metal frame made by Zanet: they are the result of a meditated re-composition, in which the artist has learned to manage the conflict between randomness and will, between responsible freedom and capricious arbitrariness.

Zanet’s research is characterized by an extensive practice of aniconic painting, marked by the centrality of the chromatic aspect, ranging from work on canvas to the use of textiles, from sculpture to environmental installation. His works are characterized by an alternation of flat backgrounds, patches of color, textures and gestural marks, made nervously with spray. They thus freely combine on the surface geometry, fluid forms and expressive calligraphic gesture, in a tight visual rhythm between elements in which harmony and dissonance chase each other without ever recomposing themselves stably.

The exhibition, with free admission, can be visited Monday through Friday from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. at Gate 44, 21 Via privata Treviso, Milan; outside these hours by appointment at 347 8379480 or info@supergiovane.com, information at https://www.supergiovane.com.

Milan, at the Gate 44 printworks the solo exhibition Ecolalia by abstract artist Giulio Zanet

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