Translation, or rather contemporary interpretation of a subject that has its roots in Greek antiquity and was then variously repeated in Roman, Renaissance and Neoclassical times. This head with its Greek profile, which presents an almost continuous line between the forehead and the nose, is taken from the Aphrodite Landolina of the National Archaeological Museum of Athens, a Roman copy of a classical sculpture to the restoration of which Antonio Canova contributed. The Landolinian type, named after the archaeologist who discovered the oldest example, presents the goddess of beauty in the "demure" version, while with the right hand she covers her breast and with the left hand she holds a drapery swept by the wind on her hips.
The work is part of a series inspired by classical statuary with which Tentolini reflects on classical models and their recurring types, continuously re-proposed over the centuries among originals, copies and casts through which the canons of beauty are perpetuated.
And he does it with a strong drawing component, in which the drawing is not the starting point, but the point of arrival, realized through an alternative and absolutely contemporary means: there is no trace of pencils, charcoals or pigments, but only superimposed layers of metal nets that - skilfully carved - create a vibrant chiaroscuro.
The stratification of a dozen sheets of hexagonal mesh - displaced, hand-cut and interwoven - becomes the perceptive weft through which the eye grasps the distinctive features of the subject: light and shadow are structuring elements of the work, as well as the mobile gaze of the observer who - approaching and moving away - is able to grasp the refined mechanism with which Tentolini internalizes and gives material consistency to impalpable visions.
An analogous experimentation is found alongside in the work Appel du vide, created for the Leonardian year, as a tribute to the Master and his skill in rendering drapery and - indirectly - to Diotti. Here, however, there is no body to cover and the folds become a pure visual game realized by "drawing" with ten layers of tulle veil, a light and semitransparent material that, cut out and superimposed, creates an airy and impalpable bas-relief with a trompe-l'oeil effect.
Here, too, a perfect knowledge of the laws of optics and light is put at the service of a technique of virtuosic dexterity, capable of making complex images emerge from a wise use of simple materials. The chiaroscuro is a question of layers: where the weave thickens, shadows are born, where it loosens, lights.
Donated by the Artist, 2019
