Aldo TAGLIAFERRO
(Legnano, 1936 - Parma, 2009)
Aldo Tagliaferro was born in Legnano (Milan), where he spent his youth, devoting himself intensively to painting from an early age. In 1953 he joined the Associazione Artistica Legnanese and went on to display his figurative works in numerous group shows organised by the association. In the meantime he was working in Milan, where he had the opportunity to frequent the avant-garde galleries.
In the early 1960s he decided to dedicate himself full-time to the artistic profession. In 1963 he held his first solo exhibition at the premises of the Legnano association, which was visited by the building contractor and art collector Felice Valadé. In the same year Valadé invited him to move to the “Quartiere delle Botteghe” in Sesto San Giovanni (Milan), a district where the contractor had built about thirty studios which he allowed artists to use in exchange for their paintings. This arrangement led to the creation of a group of artists that represented the most important trends of the time: the new figurative work of De Filippi and Ceretti, the abstract graphism of Vermi and Bionda, the objectual research of Castellani and Bonalumi and the conceptual work of Fabro etc. In this context, Tagliaferro was able to get to know these artists and compare notes with them.
After a period of reflection on his own work he identified his direction. From 1965, he began a research conceived as documentation and critical analysis of the socio-political context and human behaviour. To stay closer to reality, he used photographs taken from newspapers as evidence of events, which he then elaborated and re-proposed in a critical sense.In this process he sought formal solutions that could restore to the image the original emotive content that had been dulled by overuse, employing contrasting images and the differentiated repetition of the same image.
He displayed his first work with photos in 1965 at the San Fedele painting competition in Milan. It aroused considerable debate, since the world of art criticism maintained that photography “is not painting”.At the time it was no easy matter to display photographic works in the places traditionally dedicated to painting. Photography was considered a minor art, so that being able to show and trigger debate on such research was in itself a consolidation of one’s work.
The series of photographic works entitled Rapporto quotidiano politico (Daily political report), dating to between 1965 and 1968, represents a critical analysis of the socio-political events transmitted by the mass media of the time. The images used, taken from newspapers, enable at once both documentation and a subjective reading of reality.
In Immagini differenziate (Differentiated images) of 1968, analysis focuses on the repetition of the same image in different colours made possible by the use of peelable paper which allows emulsion to be transferred onto different supports.
The political activism of 1968 led Tagliaferro to reflect, focusing his attention on direct involvement rather than continuing with his socio-political works. In the same year he joined the Mec-Art movement, and then from 1971 on continued his photographic research independently.
Between 1968 and 1969 his research addressed the multiple possible uses of the photographic image. These studies included Immagini fusibili (Fusible images), exploring the possibility of integrating two images. Experimentation is very evident in Tagliaferro’s work, as shown by his use of peelable paper or emulsified canvas to obtain repetitive but differentiated images.
Analisi all’interno dell’ immagine e sulla sua possibilità combinatoria (Analysis within the image and on its combinatory possibilities), from 1969, addressed the subject of the commodification of women. Four images were used – a woman’s face, a man’s bust, a boy and an eye – along with a screen that had the dual function of both coagulating element and scansion of the image.
In 1970, wishing to continue to work on reality, in Verifica di una mostra (Verification of an exhibition) Tagliaferro began to use photography directly. During one of his shows he “recorded” the events so as to analyse the fruition of the art work, setting the rituals of the exhibition in relation to the behaviour of the spectator. This work was then added to the show itself. In formal terms, the work was developed with strips of enlarged frames on emulsified canvas displayed on a sloping plane, initiating a research on the macro-image and the proxemics of the fruition of the work of art.
Dating to the same year is the work Tavola didattica (Educational poster) made up of six proofs with notes for the production of the silk-screen prints of Verifica di una mostra, analysing the phases of its construction. In this way, the artist wishes to transform the contemplative space typical of the gallery into a space of knowledge and participation.
When Tagliaferro was invited to produce a work for the XXXV Biennale in Venice, with Analisi di un ruolo operativo (Analysis of an operative role) he grasped this opportunity to make a critical analysis of the artist’s role in a pre-established condition, ironically overlapping photos of artists with images of a zoo and its list of rules.
A similar work is Soggiorno temporale-Soggiorno eterno (Temporal stay-Eternal stay) of 1972, where he again uses contrasting images. In this case he critically addresses the rituals connected with the ceremonials of death, where even the pain is marketed as if it were a consumer product.
In addition to critically probing events within the social context, Tagliaferro’s research also moved in the more specific direction of human behaviour. His 1973 work, Memoria- identificazione come sovrapposizione della realtà (Memory-identification as superimposition of reality), develops an investigation of memory and identification, setting reality in relation to an intimist moment.
Sovrapposizione alla realtà (Superimposition on reality) shows photographs of the gallery walls, which are then put back in the same place and photographed again. The aim here is to demonstrate the variability of reality, even if it is unchanged, in relation to time.
In the evolution of his research and experimentation, Tagliaferro did not only contrast interacting images, he was also interested in the opposition of issues. In his 1976 work, Analisi del feticismo da un’immagine trovata (Analysis of fetishism from a found image), he shifts again to the “outside”, placing signals within our context to verify the multiple possibilities of reading an image when it is isolated and transferred from its context, proposing it in a formal solution where the spectator is captured in the image itself.
It should be stressed that Tagliaferro’s analyses always have a reference to reality. This was confirmed in 1977 in Evidenziazione attraverso la quotidianità del vivere (Highlighting through the dailiness of life) where the “recording” of the real allows him to develop an analysis of human instinct and rationality.
In the 1979 work Io-ritratto (Portrayed Ego), representing an exploration of his own ego and its mutability, the artist calls himself into question by showing his own image split in two: half positive and half negative.
This was the year in which Tagliaferro moved to Africa, to Zaire (now the Democratic Republic of the Congo), where he stayed for a couple of years, making contact with African culture. He returned to Africa again in the years that followed, visiting Nigeria where he was particularly fascinated by one of the last surviving traditions of the dark continent: the hairstyles. In the 1983 cycle Dal segno alla scrittura (From sign to writing) these hairstyles are analysed for the “signs” they trace, alienating them from their context but not from their signal sphere.
In his last work, dating to 2000, Sopra/Sotto un metro di terra (Above/below a metre of earth), Tagliaferro returns to the intimist analysis with which – through the use of three elements: the sky, the earth and the landscape – he explores the relation between himself and the “outside” in a temporal relation. In his works Tagliaferro always uses formal solutions that help to highlight the issues. Here he uses two parallel series of large-scale images that interact and, as in other earlier works, place the spectator within the image. As the artist himself explains: in the small image it is the viewer who controls the image, whereas in the large image it is the very image that interacts with the viewer.
Aldo Tagliaferro died in Parma on 30 January 2009.
SOLO EXHIBITIONS
1965
Galleria Corso Venezia – Milano
1966
Galleria 2000 – Bologna
Galleria Pagani, Milano
1967
Galleria del Grattacielo – Milano
Galleria Pagani – Milano
1969
Galleria Ciak – Roma
1970
Galleria La Bertesca – Genova
1971
Galleria Christian Stein – Torino
Galleria Paramedia – Berlino
1972
Galleria del Naviglio – Milano
Galleria Il Gelso – Lodi
1973
Galleria L’Uomo e l’Arte – Milano
1974
Galleria Il Gelso – Lodi
1976
Galleria 72 – Bergamo
1977
Galleria del Naviglio – Milano
1979
Galleria del Cavallino – Venezia
AAL/Centro Cantoni – Legnano
1983
Galleria Milano – Milano
1984
Galleria Corsini – Intra
1986
Studio Dossi – Bergamo
1988
Stanze del segno – Sciacca Terme
1997
Galleria La Meridiana – Agrate Brianza
Galleria Vanna Casati – Bergamo
2000
Galleria Melesi – Lecco
2001
Galleria Milano – Milano
Fondazione Bandera per l’Arte – Busto Arsizio
2004
Cecé Casile – Milano
2006
Galleria Elleni – Bergamo
2009
Galleria L’Elefante – Treviso
Galleria VV8 artecontemporanea – Fotografia Europea 2009 – Reggio Emilia
2010
Aldo Tagliaferro- La duplice forma dell'io - Galleria Delloro – Roma
2011
Aldo Tagliaferro – Identificazione e memoria – Chiesa di San Carlo – Fotografia Europea 2011 – Reggio Emilia
Incontro con Aldo – Una mostra in omaggio ad Aldo Tagliaferro – Maurer Zilioli Contemporary Arts – Brescia
Aldo Tagliaferro – L’immagine trovata – MAGA – Gallarate
2013
Aldo Tagliaferro. Verifica di una mostra 2.0 - Osart Gallery, Milano
2015
Aldo Tagliaferro Riscrivendo, Libreria Libri Risorti, Reggio Emilia
2018
Aldo Tagliaferro. MEMORIA IDENTIFICAZIONE - Osart Gallery, Milano
2019
Aldo Tagliaferro. Verifica di un artista, Galleria VV8, Reggio Emilia
GROUP EXHIBITIONS
1965
Premio San Fedele- Milano
Premio Ramazzotti – Milano
1966
Premio San Fedele – Milano
Premio Piazzetta – Sesto San Giovanni
1967
Biennale di Bolzano
Prospettive 3 – Galleria d’arte internazionale Due Mondi - Roma
1968
Pittura meccanica per una nuova iconografia Mec-Art – Galleria Apollinaire, Milano – Modern Art Agency, Napoli – Galleria Il Canale, Venezia
Pluralità viva – Martinengo (BG)
1969
Mec-Art/10 – Galleria Ciak, Roma
Coincidenze – Massafra (TA)
“Pro” – Museo Charlottenburg, Copenhagen
1970
“Qualcosa in più” – Galleria La Bertesca, Fiera di Genova
Confronti – Galleria Modulo, Milano
XXXV Biennale di Venezia (proposta per una esposizione sperimentale)
Arte e Fotografia – Palazzo dell’Arte, Milano
Arte e Critica '70 – Modena
Fotografia Creativa – Centro La Cappella, Trieste
1972
Faites votre jeu – Galleria del Cavallino, Venezia
Photography into Art – Camden Arts Center, Londra
Fotografia come rivelazione – Bellagio
1973
Combattimento per un’immagine – Galleria Civica d’Arte Moderna, Torino
Arte e Fotografia – Galleria Christian Stein, Torino
Medium fotografie – Städtisches Museum, Leverkusen
XV Triennale di Milano
1974
XXVIII Biennale d’Arte Città di Milano
Fotomedia – Museum am Ostwall, Dortmund
Premio Capo d’Orlando
1975
Sempre cose nuove pensando – International Cultureel Centrum, Anversa
Fotomedia – Rotonda della Besana, Milano
1976
Foto e idea, Comune di Parma
1977
Pratica Milano – Studio Marconi, Milano
Trigon 77, Graz
Premio Città di Gallarate
1978
VI Biennale della Grafica, Firenze
Artisti Lombardia degli anni ’60 – Palazzo del Turismo, Milano
1979
Mec-Art – Galleria Il Dialogo, Milano
1980
La Mec-Art – Galleria Corsini, Intra
Camere Incantate – Palazzo Reale, Milano
1981
Lombardia: Vent’anni dopo – Castello Visconteo, Pavia
1982
Arteder ’82, Bilbao
1985/86
Experimental Italian Photography – Monclair College, New Jersey – Shadai Gallery, Tokio – Teatro Municipal, Buenos Aires
1987
Ars Vivendi ’87 – Museum Reimekan, Kyushu
1988
50 anni di fotografia sperimentale in Italia (1935-1985) – Centro Culturale Pier Paolo Pasolini – Agrigento
1990
Foto/pittura – Galleria Il Gelso, Lodi
1994
Luci e Ombre – Comune di Agrate Brianza
1995
Tre autori, tre generazioni – Santa Maria delle Croci, Ravenna
1996
Oltre la cornice – Museo Ken Damy, Brescia
1998
Pagine di fotografia italiana– Galleria del Gottardo, Lugano
Fotografia e arte in Italia 1968-1998 – Galleria Civica di Modena, Modena
2001
Il colore delle ciminiere – Palazzo Leone da Perego, Legnano
2002
Fotografia italiana 1950 - 2002 - Museo Epicentro, Gala di Barcellona (ME)
La fotografia negli anni ’70, fra concetto e comportamento - Galleria Martano, Torino – Galleria Martini e Ronchetti, Genova
Arte in fotomedia - Galleria Milano, Milano
Utopie Quotidiane - PAC, Milano
Il Gelso di Giovanni Bellinzoni - Ex Chiesa di San Cristoforo, Lodi
IX esposizione nazionale Artisti per l’Epicentro – Fotografia Italiana 1950-2002, Museo delle Mattonelle Epicentro, Gala di Barcellona (ME)
2003
Percorsi della memoria - Museo Pagani, Castellanza (VA)
2004
Quetzal (con Ettore Sottsass) - Galleria Modernariato, Milano
Su la testa (promossa dalla Fondazione Mazzotta) - Stazione Centrale, Milano - Stazione Santa Lucia, Venezia
In…chiostro – Ex Monastero degli Olivetani, Nerviano (MI)
2005
Gli artisti dell’Artistica – Freddo/Caldo – Museo Pagani, Castellanza (VA)
2006
Arte senza miti – Centro Arte Contemporanea Cavalese (TN)
2007
In pubblico - Museo Villa Croce, Genova
Dal Sogno al Segno - Palazzo Leone da Perego, Legnano (MI)
2008
Tempo fotografia e creatività - Osart Gallery, Milano
Fotografando – dalla Mec-Art al digitale - Biblioteca Centro Culturale, Nembro (BG)
Idoli Pagani - Museo Pagani -Castellanza (VA)
2009
Second Skin - Spazio Paraggi, Treviso
Mostra collettiva di artisti contemporanei - Galleria L’Elefante, Treviso
2010
MEC ART – Arte oltre la fine della pittura - Galleria Elleni, Bergamo
La Polifonia del Mondo – Fotografie 1964 - 2010 - De Primi Fine Art, Lugano
Visi, ritratti, corpi - MACRO (Museo d’Arte Contemporanea Roma)Roma
MEC ART - Arte oltre la fine della pittura - Frittelli Arte Contemporanea, Firenze
Mostra prime acquisizioni Collezione Civica d’Arte - Museo d’Arte Contemporanea, Sella di Lodrignano, Neviano degli Arduini (PR)
Geografia senza punti cardinali – La fotografia nell’arte degli anni ’70 in Italia - Galleria Giorgio Persano, Torino
Il linguaggio fotografico associato al progetto - Galleria L’Elefante - Treviso
2011
Mec-Art Italiana - Bergamo Arte Fiera - Bergamo
Memoria Variabile - Galleria Milano - Milano
Sulla Parola – Le Parole nell’arte tra Sessanta e Settanta - Fabbriche Chiaramontane, Agrigento
MEC ART – Oltre la pittura, verso la fotografia - Galleria d’Arte Bergamo, Bergamo
FOTO/GRAFIA - Galleria Elleni - Bergamo
Italian '70s – Arte concettuale italiana - Osart Gallery, Milano
2012
Ad libitum - Fondazione Bandera per l’Arte, Busto Arsizio
Arte e Ambiente - Galleria L’Elefante, Treviso
Homini & Domini – Il corpo nell’arte fotografica, Libreria Lovat, Villorba (TV)
Gli spazi dell’arte – Dalla pop art al concettuale, Antico Palazzo di Città, Cagliari
Il corpo solitario – Autoscatti contemporanei, Maurer Zilioli Contemporary Arts, Brescia
2013
“Con lo sguardo degli altri”. La collezione fotografica di Roberto Mutti - Palazzo Comunale, Seriate (BG)
Corpi in azione / Corpi in visione - Esperienze e indagini artistiche 1965-1980 - Museo Pecci, Milano
Arte e Antropologia: opere ed esperienze negli anni Settanta - Il Chiostro Arte Contemporanea, Saronno (VA)
E subito riprende il viaggio …, Triennale di Milano
ll cadavere e il chirurg - La Bottega di Cecé Casile, Milano
Sguardi sul tempo - Percorsi nella fotografia d’autore - Casa dei Carraresi, Treviso
E subito riprende il viaggio …, Reggia di Monza
Il corpo solitario – Autoscatti contemporanei -Palazzo della Penna, Perugia
FOTO/grafia - Spazio19, Treviglio (BG)
2015
Renata Boero | Giorgio Ciam | Luca Serra | Aldo Tagliaferro - VV8 Arte Contemporanea, Reggio Emilia
2016
L'inarchiviabile / The Unarchivable. Italia anni '70 - FM Centro per l'arte contemporanea, Frigoriferi Milanesi, Milano
FLASHBACK. Fotografia italiana di sperimentazione 1960-2016 - Palazzo Ducale, Genova
Le stanze della fotografia - Palazzo Leone Da Perego, Legnano
Conceptual Photography - Osart Gallery, Milano
Conceptual Photography. Fotografia concettuale e internazionale anni '60/'70 - TOMAV, Moresco
Camere in prestito - Photographica Fine Arts, Lugano
Versus. La sfida dell'artista al suo modello in un secolo di fotografia e disegno - Galleria Civica di Modena, Palazzo Santa Margherita, Modena
Flashback. Fotografia italiana di sperimentazione 1960-2016 - Palazzo Ducale, Genova
Conceptual Photography. Vito Acconci, Vincenzo Agnetti, Carlo Massimo Asnaghi, Giuseppe Chiari, Giuseppe Desiato, Joe Jones, Kenneth Josephson, Ketty La Rocca, Elio Mariani, Duane Michals, Dennis Oppenheim, Claudio Parmiggiani, Aldo Tagliaferro, Franco Vaccari, Minor White, Michele Zaza, TOMAV – Torre di Moresco Centro Arti Visive, Moresco (FM)
Le stanze della fotografia, Palazzo Leone da Perego, Legnano
L'immagine della parola, Galleria L'Elefante, Treviso
Camere in prestito, Galleria Photographica Fine Art, Lugano
Dieci Anni di Fotografia Europea 2007 -2016. VV8 arte contemporanea, Reggio Emilia
2017
Questioni di Famiglie - Centro Italiano della Fotografia d'Autore-Bibbiena (AR)
Cielo e terra - Galleria Milano - Milano
Settant'anni nei sentieri dell'arte – essere nel contemporaneo - Pinacoteca del Castello Visconteo, Legnano
2018
PHOTOSEQUENCES -Osart Gallery, Milano
Mario Cresci e Aldo Tagliaferro. Interferenze - Galleria Elleni, Bergamo