Mauro Chessa (turin, 1933-2022) Still Life With Mirror

Mauro Chessa (Turin, 1933-2022) Still Life With Mirror, oil on canvas, cm 60x100;
with frame cm 67,5x107,5x4;
signed lower right

Exhibitions: Mauro Chessa's solo exhibition;
                   (Turin, Davico Art Gallery, May 1984)

Provenance: Turin, Davico Art Gallery;
                      Turin, private collection


He is the son of the painter Gigi Chessa, one of the members of the historic group "I Sei di Torino," and Ottavia Cabutti. His mother, who became a widow in 1935, remarried Francesco Menzio, also a member of the same group. After completing his classical studies, Mauro studied painting at the Albertina Academy under the guidance of Menzio and Mario Calandri. He began exhibiting in 1954, participating in the shows of the group "Undici giovani pittori di Torino" (Eleven Young Painters of Turin), which included Nino Aimone, Romano Campagnoli, Francesco Casorati, Sandro De Alexandris, Gino Gorza, Giorgio Ramella, Piero Ruggeri, Giacomo Soffiantino, Mario Surbone, and Francesco Tabusso. The group was interested in painting but still approached this activity in "idealistic" terms, with the awareness of being "different."
In 1953, together with Nino Aimone, Francesco Casorati, Alberto Ca' Zorzi, Alberto Ninotti, and Francesco Tabusso, he was among the founders of the magazine "Orsa Minore," which involved personalities from the cultural scene such as Massimo Mila, Vincenzo Ciuffi, Luigi Perrachio, Edoardo Sanguineti, as well as young writers and painters like Fausto Amodei, Lucio Cabutti, Sergio Saroni, Tobia Scarpa, Gianpaolo Ormezzano, and others.
Like others of his generation, he made his debut at the Venice Biennale, exhibiting in '56 and then in '58. After completing his painting diploma, he taught figure drawing at the Liceo Artistico from 1958 to 1980.
Initially influenced by existential realism, which he gradually distanced himself from after a few years, Chessa's interests shifted towards "Informal Painting" and American "Action Painting" (especially for the expressive use of paint matter), leading him back to a more figurative dimension. At the beginning, his work showed the influence of Francis Bacon before developing into his own personal vision. During these early years, he held numerous solo exhibitions in cities such as Turin, Milan, Nuremberg, Rome, London, Bologna, and Venice.
In the late 1960s, dissatisfied with his recent experiences, he stopped painting to focus on film experiments, an old passion from his early adolescence. He worked on underground films, animation, and counter-information videos. Around 1974, he returned to painting, and writer Giovanni Arpino, while presenting his solo exhibition in '79 at the Gian Ferrari Gallery in Milan, explained: "Chessa was right to 'be silent.' He had to rediscover the reasons for 'narrating.'" His research now follows "cycles" respecting the "genres" and adhering to "classical systems of compositional organization." His attention to reality is reflected in still lifes depicting everyday objects, suburban views (abandoned factories, railways, underpasses), natural landscapes (woods, ponds), and mainly female figures explored in their absorbed humanity.
His exhibitions, from the resumption of his career until today, have been numerous. Notable solo exhibitions include those at the Gian Ferrari Gallery in Milan, Arte Club in Turin, Davico Gallery in Turin, Il Tempietto arte moderna in Brindisi, Forni Gallery in Bologna, Trentadue Gallery in Milan, Il nuovo fanale Gallery in Genoa, Pomone Gallery in Lutry (Lausanne), Il Cenacolo Gallery in Piacenza, Sorrenti Gallery in Novara, Centro Comunale di Cultura with the exhibition "Il mestiere del pittore" (The Painter's Craft) in Valenza Po, Lomellini Palace with an anthological exhibition in Carmagnola, Biasutti Gallery in Turin, Appiani Arte in Milan, Schreiber Gallery in Brescia, Mercurio Gallery in Biella, Centro Culturale del ponte in Susa, and Berman Gallery in Turin.
Among the main national and international group exhibitions: "L'immagine e il suo doppio" (The Image and Its Double), Palazzo Bagatti Valsecchi in Milan; "Palazzo della Promotrice" in Turin; "Cinq peintres de Turin" (Five Painters from Turin), Maison d'art alsacienne in Strasbourg; "Paesaggio senza territorio" (Landscape without Territory), "La natura morta nell'arte italiana del Novecento" (Still Life in Italian 20th-century Art) curated by Vittorio Sgarbi; "Il Po del '900" (The Po River of the 20th Century), curated by Laura Gavioli, at Castello di Mesola; "Roberto Tassi e i pittori" (Roberto Tassi and the Painters), "La figura" (The Figure), Palazzo Sarcinelli in Conegliano, curated by Marco Goldin; "Sur le versant de la peinture - 11 peintres à Turin" (On the Slope of Painting - 11 Painters in Turin), curated by Gianfranco Bruno, Museo Archeologico in Aosta; "La parabola dei ciechi" (The Parable of the Blind), "Lions international" in Turin, Rome, Washington, and New York.
In 2001, the Piedmont Region dedicated a major anthological exhibition to him at the Sala Bolaffi in Turin, curated by Marco Rosci and Pino Mantovani, titled "La buccia delle cose" (The Peel of Things).
In 2004, he painted two large works about the Resistance (Partigiani nella notte, I ventiquattro giorni di Alba) permanently installed on the walls of the monumental staircase of the Municipality of Alba.
Among the numerous writers and critics who have written about his work are Luigi Carluccio, Francesco Arcangeli, Felice Casorati, Tristan Sauvage, Massimo Mila, Albino Galvano, Italo Calvino, Paolo Fossati, Italo Cremona, Giovanni Arpino, Claudio Malberti, François Debluë, Paolo Levi, Roberto Tassi, Vittorio Sgarbi, Marco Rosci, Pino Mantovani, Gianfranco Bruno, Marco Goldin, Massimo Novelli, Guido Curto, and Francesco De Bartolomeis.

Good state of preservation

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