PAINTINGS IN PUBLIC SPACES

This bas-relief was carried out by Fiume in 1943 during his stay at the military hospital of Novara (Piedmont) whose building was known as Caserma (=Barracks) Gherzi. It is a tribute to all the doctors who spared no effort treating the wounded in various wars, and has remained in the disused barracks ever since. In 2011 a student of the Novara high school, Andrea Baiardi, wrote a thesis on the forgotten bas-relief as well as a number of articles in the Novara “Noi” (=Us) magazine which drew the attention of media and politicians. The local Administration and the Superintendent of Arts are exploring ways of making it accessible to the public.

During the 1950 Venice Biennial, invited there on Alberto Savinio’ suggestion, Fiume exhibited a large triptych to which Life Magazine dedicated a whole page while commissioning him a few works for its New York Headquarters. In those paintings Fiume represented an imaginary reconstruction of Manhattan’s architectures where part of its skyscrapers seemed to have been conceived as prehistoric islands of statues.

In 1949, during his exhibition at the Galleria Borromini of Milan, Mr Alfred Barr, Director of Collections at the MoMA of New York acquired this Island of Statues of 1947.

In 1975 Monsignor Pasquale Macchi, the private secretary of Pope Paul VI, asked Fiume to paint a crucifixion for the collection of religious art he was collecting in honour of the Pope from the most important contemporary artists.