It is a tribute to the master Paolo Masi the solo exhibition at Frittelli arte contemporanea which opens on 2023 May 11th, on the very day of his 90th birthday. 

Entitled Paolo Masi in Florence. Opere degli anni Ottanta [Paintings from the Eighties], the exhibition, curated by Fabio Cavallucci, will remain open until September 9th, presenting a large corpus of paintings.

To manifest the close relationship between Paolo Masi and Florence - a relationship “not always of love”, the artist would probably say - the exhibition re-proposes the large paintings on canvas exhibited in 1985 at the Sala d'Arme of Palazzo Vecchio in one of the tributes offered to him by the city, in the past not always generous with its artists.

Based on an atomized painting, a sort of dripping that, compared to Pollock's, accentuates systematicity by giving a sense of underlying uniformity, on closer inspection they are traversed by nuances of rare ability and elegance. Talking about these works, Masi thinks back to the history of art, back to that time - the 1980s in fact - when the entire art system turned towards the past. 

Masi himself cites, specifically Seurat's pointillism. But in his case the quotation is only a pretext, a reference that cannot help but be overwhelmed by his interest in the world and its broader developments. There is in these artworks a search for nature, for the state of calm and peace that it can offer. But there is also the reflection of technology, of what was then the dominant communication instrument: the television, of which paintings seem to collect the buzz of pixels that light up the screen with a thousand colors and reflections. 

Filiberto Menna had spoken of “analytical painting” - not a movement, nor a group of artists, but a trend that brought together artists devoted to a painting that was above all critical of itself, of its possibility of representing the world, and therefore willing to study its internal principles, its operating mechanisms. To some extent Masi is part of this, also because of his constant, irreducible devotion to painting. But on the other hand, a different interest leaks out in him, not for a sterile, tautological research into language, but for a specific language that only makes sense as a means of speaking about the world and to the world. 

In this attempt to relate - utopian, probably - is perhaps to be found the whole path of an artist who has never really stopped believing that art can change reality. 

And perhaps this also explains the recognition that is now being given to him: a recognition of the artistic, but also human, merit of the many friends who, marked by his generous sensitivity towards them, cannot now help but return him a sign of esteem and friendship. 

On Wednesday, 10 May, there will be a very special exhibition-tribute by the artist friends of the Base collective.

In addition, this year Paolo Masi will also be celebrated abroad by our Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation, with the exhibition organized by the Italian Cultural Institute of Bratislava at the Civic Gallery of Žilina, in Slovakia, which will open on 18 May and can be visited until 9 September 2023.

The exhibition at Frittelli arte contemporanea is accompanied by a rich catalogue, edited by Fabio Cavallucci, produced by Dario Cimorelli Editore, with an introduction by Carlo Frittelli, a text by the curator and reproductions of the artworks on display.