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The Nostalgia
of the Poet
1914
Oil and charcoal on canvas
89.7 x 40.7 cm
76.2553 PG 65 |
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This work belongs to a series of paintings of 1914 on
the subject of the poet. Recurrent motifs in the sequence
are the plaster bust with dark glasses, the mannequin,
and the fish mold on an obelisk. These objects, bearing
no evident relationships to one another, are compressed
here into a narrow vertical format that creates a claustrophobic
and enigmatic space.
The use of inanimate forms imitating or alluding to
human beings has complex ramifications. The sculpture
at the lower left is a painted representation of a plaster
cast from a stone, marble, or metal bust by an imaginary,
or at present unidentified, sculptor. The fish is a
charcoal drawing of a metal mold that could produce
a baked “cast” of a fish made with an actual
fish, with additional connotations as a religious symbol.
The mannequin is a simplified cloth cast of a human
figure. Each object, though treated as solid and static,
dissolves in multiple significations and paradoxes.
Such amalgams of elusive meaning in Giorgio
de Chirico's strangely intense objects compelled
the attention of the Surrealists.
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