GILBERTO ZORIO 

Gilberto Zorio: 'Du creux de i'enfer au creux du Vesuvio'. Bricks, black light, phosphorus, flourescense. Installation view. Le Creux de l’enfer Centre d’Art Contemporain, Thiers (2005)

Gilberto Zorio belongs to a generation of Italian artists who in the mid 1960s pioneered a radical and distinguished artistic movement which later became known as Arte Povera. Through the use of often modest and humble materials, these artists posed sophisticated and profound questions about the very nature of human existence.

This will be Zorio’s first solo exhibition in the UK and will include new installations made specifically for Milton Keynes Gallery’s spaces combined with works that trace the historical points of his practice.

Energy, through the use of elemental forces, is essential to Zorio’s work and is addressed in many ways, from the near invisibility of oxidisation and its effect on copper to the ferocious heat of metal welding. Zorio’s use of different metals such as lead, copper and steel connects his work to a lineage of historical and primordial forms of
creative expression.

Germano Celant, the curator and art critic who introduced the theory of Arte Povera will be in conversation with Zorio on Wednesday 26 November at 7 – 8.30 pm.