Fernando Melani

Fernando Melani (* 1907 in San Piero Agliana , Italy , † 1985 in Pistoia ) was an Italian minimalist painter , object and concept artist and representative of Arte Povera in Italy.

life and work

Fernando Melani's interest in art began in 1945, immediately after World War II, when he started painting. His first works are in the style of the painters of the early twentieth century and he devoted himself to landscape painting . He quickly began to paint abstractly .

In 1953 he published " Davanti alla Pittura ", a text that described how works of abstract art are to be understood. In 1967 he had his first solo exhibition at the Galleria Numero in Milan with a catalog by Caria Lonzi .

Fernando Melani is an eccentric and exceptional artist. As an autodidact , he carried out his unique artistic work in isolation in his house and studio in Corso Gramsci in Pistoia from 1945 to 1985 and designed the house as a total work of art. In the 1970s he built and designed the first floor of his house with a living room, from 1980 to 1981 he worked on the work “ Bucati ”, the library room . The walls and ceilings are designed with wires and various materials and his pictures are spread throughout the house. His special activity consisted in the testing of materials and theoretical considerations that are deposited in many written documents.

In 1972 he was a participant in Documenta 5 in Kassel in the Individual Mythologies department with some works .

In 1990 a large retrospective of his work was shown in the Palazzo Fabroni in Pistoia.

Literature and Sources

• Exhibition catalog: documenta 5. Survey of Reality - Imagery Today ; Catalog (as a file folder) Volume 1: (Material); Volume 2: (list of exhibits); Kassel 1972
• documenta archive (ed.); Resubmission d5 - A survey of the archive on documenta 1972 ; Kassel / Ostfildern 2001, ISBN 3-7757-1121-X

Web links

• The museum in his house in Pistoia
• Materials by and about Fernando Melani in the documenta archive