Mimmo Rotella

Rotella, Domenico

Italian, 1918 - 2006

Explore Selected Works

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6 Prison Poems from S.M.S. No. 4 (August 1968)

Mimmo Rotella, The Letter Edged in Black Press Inc. · published 1968 · offset lithograph in blue and black on four sheets of grey wove paper with debossing; one offset lithograph on yellow loose leaf paper, torn; one color offset lithograph on cardstock; and one offset lithograph on wove paper ·  Accession ID  1992.62.4.7.a-g

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S.M.S. (August 1968)

Various Artists, Robert Marshall Watts, Mimmo Rotella, Arman, Hollis Frampton, Paul Bergtold, Roy Lichtenstein, Lil Picard, John Cage, Princess Winifred, On Kawara · published 1968 · portfolio containing mixed media art objects ·  Accession ID  1992.62.4.1-10.a-c

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The International Avant-Garde, No.16

Mimmo Rotella · published 1962 · etching ·  Accession ID  1964.8.1694.p

Sheets of cream-white and slate-blue paper are layered and then torn away to create a textured collage peppered with blurry, coffee-brown spots, sometimes densely spaced, and a few speckles and streaks of terracotta red in this rectangular, abstract composition. The artist created this work using a process called decollage, where layers of paper are first adhered to the surface of the canvas and then some are stripped away to reveal the layers beneath. The first impression of this composition could be of an incomplete antique map, especially because the largest white form, to our left, is reminiscent of the shape of North America, and a crease running across the center is like the equator on a map. A strip of off-white paper also lines the right edge of the canvas and about a dozen small, jagged white shapes are spread across the work. In some areas, especially in the upper right quadrant, an under-layer of paper patterned with a grid of dark lines over lime green and raspberry pink shows through one or more layers of paper. The brown dots resemble foxing, as if some of the paper was discolored or stained. Most of the terracotta-red streaks are concentrated on the large shape to our left, but there are spots scattered lightly across much of the composition. Some of the white areas are textured, and could include adhesive or paste, and the blue paper is wrinkled throughout.
Mimmo Rotella, Muro Romano, 1958, collage on canvas, Gift of Fondazione Mimmo Rotella, 2006.156.1

Muro Romano

Mimmo Rotella · 1958 · collage on canvas ·  Accession ID  2006.156.1