COLLAGES, STONE TABLET DRAWINGS, AND PAINTINGS – ALBERTO MAGNELLI
PRESS RELEASE
In 1986, the Musée National d’Art Moderne/Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris organized a comprehensive exhibition showcasing Alberto Magnelli’s (1888-1971) collages and stone tablet paintings. This exhibition is part of a broader series dedicated to presenting lesser-known aspects of the early 20th century’s great masters. Previous exhibitions in this series have included Léger and the Poetry of Objects, Laurens’ Cubist Period, and Arp’s Torn Paper Works.
While the most renowned periods of Magnelli’s production span from 1937 until his death in 1971, he was already a pioneer of abstract art during the first decade of the 20th century. The exhibition now presented in Finland includes selections of Magnelli’s paintings from different phases of his career, starting from 1914, drawn from French and international museum collections as well as private collections. Works acquired for Finnish collections, such as those from the Sara Hildén Art Museum and the Alvar Aalto Museum, are also on display.
When Alberto Magnelli began creating collages in 1936, he developed a unique version of the form, distinct from both Cubist papier collé and Surrealist collage. Approaching the technique as an abstract painter, he explored relationships between materials and the forms of pre-existing or custom-cut elements. Magnelli’s collages do not align with the Surrealist view of collage as a “challenge to painting.”
The everyday materials Magnelli employed—oxidized iron plates, sandpaper, ropes, tarred wrapping papers, etc.—reveal their hidden possibilities in a new context, providing the painter with a novel palette.
Between 1936 and 1966, Magnelli’s collages evolved alongside his paintings, becoming increasingly simplified and monumental in character. The colors of the materials he used are deliberately limited to emphasize the austerity of the works—beige, brown, black, dark blue, and bottle green dominate the compositions.
The Music series of collages, created in Grasse during the Occupation, stands out for its free structure and humor, reflecting how the collage technique—compared to the slow process of painting—resembles jazz: quick improvisation and imaginative freedom.
Magnelli’s small-scale stone tablet paintings, made on school slate boards, were also primarily painted in Grasse between 1940 and 1943. The wooden edges of the slates function as natural frames for the paintings. Lacking canvas and oil paints during the war, Magnelli used these works to preserve numerous ideas, which he later realized in his oil paintings after the war.
These miniature paintings continued to fascinate Magnelli throughout his career. They reveal his imagination and sense of humor, often hidden behind the austerity of his paintings. For the first time, this exhibition offers audiences a glimpse into this “secret garden” of the artist, showcasing his more human and playful dimension.
The exhibition’s curator is Daniel Abadie from the Musée National d’Art Moderne/Centre Georges Pompidou. The presentation includes 35 collages, approximately 30 stone tablet paintings, and 15 oil paintings.
The exhibition is organized in Finland by the Pori Art Museum (February–March) and the Joensuu Art Museum (May) in 1987.
Translated with ChatGPT