Lucio Fontana

Concepts in artworks as visual explanations of ideas. Italian artist Lucio Fontana tore apart the modern art establishment—literally. Trained initially as a sculptor, Fontana (1899-1968) blurred the lines between painting and sculpture by creating works that combined both form and color in a spatial context, most famously exemplified by his slashed canvases of the 1950s and 60s. Fontana's work was truly conceptual, in that the ideas he wanted to express were more important than the actual work itself; with titles like Concetto Spaziale (Spatial Concept) and Scultura Spaziale (Spatial Sculpture), his pieces served as visual explanations of his ideas. From his early work collaborating with architects, through his years in Buenos Aires where he published the "White Manifesto" and "Technical Manifesto of Spatialism," to his experimental light installations of the early 1950s and later experiments with various media, this book covers the entire career of Italy’s pioneering abstract artist. About the series: Each book in TASCHEN’s Basic Art series.