Pino Pascali was born in Bari in 1935; his family later moved to Polignano a Mare. After graduating from the Liceo artistico in Naples, he enrolled at the Accademia di Belle Arti in Rome in 1956, where he attended Toti Scialoja's set design course. During these years, he began to frequent the artists of the so-called Gruppo di Piazza del Popolo and began working as an assistant set designer in several RAI productions, as well as collaborating with Studio Saraceni and Lodolofilm as a set designer and graphic designer for television advertising. With the latter, thanks to his friendship with Sandro Lodolo, he worked until the year of his death in 1968.

The works for advertising realised by Pino Pascali between 1958 and 1968 - unfortunately still little known to the general public - gradually gained a place of high interest and wide consideration in the artistic world, so much so that they are defined, like his other pictorial or sculptural works, as creations of unquestionable taste and creative ability. This opinion definitively overrode the initial perplexity of some who, not recognising their expressive freedom, because they were the result of work commissions, would have wanted to downgrade them to a level without any artistic merit or even bury them, considering them detrimental to the artist's image.

Lodolo Film, of which Sandro Lodolo was the owner, was an opportunity for Pino to move into a non-sculptural and unstaged artistic environment that gave him the chance to play with other and different artistic realities. Pascali, at the same time, continued to create the sculptural works that were exhibited at galleria La Tartaruga, at galleria Sperone in Turin or at Sargentini's L'Attico.

And from this parallel, little-known work - and also for this reason exquisitely precious - comes a versatile Pascali with a multifaceted character, who engages in graphics as well as sculpture, in light ink or graphite decoration as well as in the use of earth or wood. An artist, in short, who does not betray his playful and amused nature and who, as always, conceals the irony behind his works and the playfulness behind the work.

Pascali, therefore, like Warhol, debuted as a graphic artist. And in his graphic and advertising work, it should be noted that, as in his sculptural production, he was never repetitive. Scrolling through the drawings and sketches of the characters, one finds oneself in a very long series of techniques, styles and choices of materials that give such broad examples that they cannot fail to arouse interest and curiosity. And which undeniably offers important tools and references for an even deeper understanding of Pino's work.

The advertising sector was not the only one to which Pascali dedicated his work. In 1963 Tullio Zitkowsky, who had been his classmate at the Academy of Fine Arts, and who worked as a set designer at RAI, introduced him as assistant set designer to Carlo Cesarini da Senigallia in the production of a new television programme. It was thus that Pascali worked for the variety show La biblioteca di Studio Uno (1963), Napoli contro tutti (1964), for the RAI screenplay Il Conte di Montecristo (1964) and Scala Reale (1965).

It clearly emerges that Pino Pascali did not work in advertising as a fallback, but out of true harmony with his inspiration. Of course, the drawings for advertising are quite different from the museum works, but only in terms of the end result. Pino remains the same, with the same inventiveness, the same energy, the same will to research. In him, the germ of great sculpture took shape and grew in the sketches and drafts and then became large and monumental in the dinosaurs and tanks.

Gestures that did not escape the careful scrutiny of prominent critics such as Alberto Boatto, Vittorio Rubiu, Achille Bonito Oliva, Maurizio Calvesi, Enrico Crispolti, Anna D'Elia and Livia Velani.

In January 1965 he exhibited works including Pezzi di donne [Pieces of women], Muro di pietra [Stone wall] and Ruderi sul prato [Ruins on the grass] at Galleria la Tartaruga di Plinio de Martiis, while in April he presented Teatrino [Little scene] at the Feltrinelli bookstore.

In summer, he realised the installation-performance Requiescat: funerale di Corradino di Svevia e dell'arte del momento [Requiescat: funeral of Corradino of Svevia and of the art of the moment], in which he himself was the officiant, for the Galleria La Salita.

The following year, he presented the cycle Armi [Weapons] at Galleria Sperone in Turin and began working on his first works in white canvas on ribs.

In the autumn he held an exhibition at Fabio Sargentini's presenting the series of animals and trophies and the works Il mare [The Sea], Barca che affonda [Sinking Boat], Balene [Whales].

His first solo exhibition abroad was held in 1967 at the Thelen Galerie in Essen, Germany.

In June, he presented a cycle of new works inspired by the elements of nature: Pozzanghere [Puddles], 1 metro cubo di terra [1 cubic meter of soil] and 2 metri cubi di terra [2 cubic meter of soil] (which he also exhibited at the exhibition curated by Germano Celant Arte povera - Im spazio in Genoa).

At the Exhibition of Italian contemporary art in Tokyo and Kyoto, he presented Ricostruzione della balena [Reconstruction of the Whale].

In October he exhibited Campi coltivati [Cultivated fields], Cornice di fieno [Hay frame] and Canali di irrigazione [Irrigation canals]at the Jolas Gallery in Milan, presented by Cesare Brandi.

In December at the National Gallery of Modern Art in Rome, together with Eliseo Mattiacci he presented Campi arati [Ploughed fields] and Canali di irrigazione [Irrigation canals].

Also in 1967: Modigliani Award in Livorno; Reality of the image and structures of vision at the Cerchio in Rome; Beyond Sculpture in Pescara, Expo 67 in Montreal; International Youth Salon at Palazzo Ancarani in Spoleto; Proposte Uno in Avezzano; Exhibition of Contemporary Art in Tokyo; 5th Youth Biennial in Paris; 3rd Art Review of Southern Italy in Naples; 9th Biennial in São Paulo; Art Objectif in Paris.

In March 1968, Giulio Carlo Argan presented his Bachi da setola [Bristle worms] for the first time at the Jolas Galerie in Paris. The same year he took part in the XXXIV Venice Biennale with a solo room.

Following a motorbike accident he died in September while the exhibition was still open, at the end of which he was awarded the International Prize for Sculpture.

He is considered one of the greatest exponents of Arte Povera, together with M. Pistoletto, J. Kounellis, M. Merz, E. Mattiacci, R. Mambor, S. Lombardo, C. Tacchi.