Lot 144: VINICIO PALADINI (1902-1971)

Movement and Space Photomontage with gelatin silver print, halftone and colored paper elements. Circa 1930. Credit by the artist in ink on the recto. 13 3/8 x 9 3/8in. (34 x 23.8cm.) Framed. LITERATURE See: Lista, Futurism and Photography, pp. 118-123, for additional examples of Paladini's photomontage work. NOTES Vinicio Paladini, a painter and architect, was born in Moscow but lived for most of his life in Rome. There he came to know the Futurist painter Giacomo Balla who influenced his work along with Umberto Boccioni. A member of the Communist community in Rome, Paladini incorporated his theories of mechanical art with his interest in the alliance of the proletariat and the artists of the avant-garde. Along with Ivo Pannaggi he published L'arte meccanica futurista in 1922. Inspired by Russian Constructivism his work combined "the austere figuration of metaphysical art with the mechanical aesthetics of L'Esprit Nouveau discovered through the painting of Fernand L‚ger." Throughout the 1920s his views on Futurism, Contructivism and Dadaism were widely published. In 1926 he founded the Movimento Immaginista which fused many avant-garde movements, including Dadaism, Surrealism and Futurism. His montages incorporated Classical motifs, themes of sport, the city and the dynamism of modern life. (Lista, pp. 146-147.) Photomontages by Paladini rarely appear at auction. Many extant examples are maintained in institutional and private collections.