Ugo Tapparini - Untitled

The ironic caricature that underpins Ugo Tapparini's pictorial production extends even to traditional genres such as still life. The "Natura Morta" genre first emerged in the early 17th century. It consists of compositions of inanimate subjects, most often flowers or fruit. While initially it was an opportunity for painters to experiment with naturalistic or photographic reproductions of reality, with contemporary art the "Natura Morta" also becomes a way of interpreting reality. Indeed, as was the case, for example, with the Cubist avant-garde or Giorgio Morandi, the artist's in-depth exploration of objects was ultimately aimed at a conceptual representation, taken beyond the mere sensory element. In its caricatural spirit, Tapparini's still life features a pig's head, which the artist inflates to the point of absurdity, as was customary in his subjects.

Ugo Tapparini's depiction of everyday life has an ironic, grotesque quality, likely with various allegorical and satirical interpretations. The language used has strong connections to the German New Objectivity artistic movement. The same simplified and infantile interpretation of a realism based on caricature is evident. We find the same cynical nature of painters like George Grosz or Otto Dix in lashing out at their own society with lucid irony. Another important reference for Tapparini is the Colombian Fernando Botero, with whom he shares a penchant for inflating the forms of his subjects. However, compared to both the Germans and Botero, Tapparini eschews the latter's marked plasticity in favor of a different expressive modality. Formally, we can fully admire the expressive power of the bold, vibrant black line that synthesizes the subjects with just a few strokes. Tapparini's palette, moreover, focuses on pure shades, of a primary brilliance, which generate balanced contrasts.

Ugo Tapparini was born in Lecce in 1933 to a Veronese family and passed away in 2016. From a very young age, Tapparini lived in an environment closely linked to culture and art. His mother was a writer and painter, and his uncle was a poet. He initially moved to Rome to pursue a career as a journalist. In Lecce, he played a significant role in the launch of the first local private television channel in the 1970s, alongside director Angelo Barbano. Paolo Rizzi, Pietro Marino, Marco Ramperti, Giulio Carlo Argan, Giorgio Mascherpa, Mario Soldati, Mario Monteverdi, and Bolaffi Arte have written about him.

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