Untitled (Diptych)

Artist Mimmo Paladino (Italian, born 1948)

Place of OriginItaly

Date1986

Dimensions(Upper panel) H: 58 7/8 in. (149.5 cm); W: 78 5/8 in. (199.7 cm);
(Lower panel) H: 58 7/8 in. (149.5 cm); W: 78 5/8 in. (199.7 cm);
Installed Height between panels: 4 in. (10.2 cm)

MediumMixed media on wood.

ClassificationPaintings

Credit LinePurchased with funds from the Libbey Endowment, Gift of Edward Drummond Libbey

Object number

1987.225A-B

Not on View

Label Text"Even when it sometimes seems so, my pictures do not tell stories; they contain no explanations, only allusions…." Mimmo Paladino’s images often evoke mysterious themes of ritual, sacrifice, and the world of the dead. The black-robed figure in the center of the lower panel wears a white mask, simultaneously suggesting ancient Greek tragic drama, early Christian imagery, African tribal rituals, and early 20th-century Cubism. The figure is flanked by skull-like heads and a fish clasped in disembodied hands within an upturned chalice shape on an altar or pedestal. The open umbrella shape in the upper panel seems to double as a cave or a tomb. Another masked face plus two additional enigmatic figures are inside/beneath it. Born in a small town in southern Italy, Paladino brings to his art a sense of the layers of past civilizations, with their deities and myths. The physical scale of this two-paneled painting, its simplified forms, and somber colors on gold leaf all work to dramatize his exploration of memory, the past, and the metaphysical realm.