Enrico Crispolti, Lucio Fontana: Catalogue raisonné des peintures, sculptures et environments spatiaux, vol. II, Brussels, 1974, no. 59 T 79, pp. 84-85 (illustrated)
Enrico Crispolti, Fontana: Catalolgo generale, vol. I, Milan, 1986, no. no. 59 T 79, p. 294 (illustrated)
Enrico Crispolti, Lucio Fontana: Catalogo ragionato di sculture, dipinti, ambientazioni, vol. II, Milan, 2006, no. 59 T 79, p.459 (illustrated)

‘With the slash I invented a formula that I don’t think can be further perfected. I managed with this formula to give the spectator an impression of spatial calm, of cosmic rigor, of serenity in infinity…’ — Lucio Fontana

Lucio Fontana’s Tagli – his slashed canvases – revolutionised not just his own artistic career in the late 1950s, as they marked the peak and pinnacle of his conceptual journey; they also marked an important shift in twentieth century art historical discourse, as subversive works combatting long-standing principles of pictorial flatness. An inherently iconoclastic gesture, the slashing of canvases indeed signalled a clear desire to break with representational norms. Created between 1959 and Fontana’s death in 1968, the Tagli paintings all underwent a meticulous method of deconstruction. The canvases were first soaked in the artist’s chosen monochromatic pigment, only to be immediately sliced in one clear motion with a Stanley knife. Manipulating his canvases through the addition of colour and the simultaneous disruption of fabric, Fontana bent traditional tenets of painting and objecthood, in some ways merging both, and exploring, by the same token, the very notions of space and materiality.

Examples of the Concetto spaziale, Attese series can be found in the best public and private modern art collections worldwide, including The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, Kunstmuseum Basel, and The National Museum of Art, Tokyo.