Cover, image source: Christoph Schifferli

Publisher Note

Francis of Assisi was the saint who humanised sainthood. He was a man with an ordinary body and ordinary desires. As Tacita Dean writes, 'He rolled naked in the snow to quell his urges and trod the land on paths and roads that are still wending their way through the hills and forests of Umbria today ... His concerns are contemporary: his love of the earth is ecology, his care for its creatures, animal welfare, and his understanding of his fellow humanity is modern-day social science. He is the saint whom mankind can realistically aspire to emulate, because his humanness, his humanity lies just within our mortal reach.' In her work, Buon Fresco, 2014, Dean filmed details of Giotto's frescos in the Upper Basilica in Assisi using a macro lens, in order, she said, to have the perspective of the artist himself. Giotto humanised the depiction of people in painting in a parallel way to St Francis's humanising of sainthood, and this moment, when the radical artist depicted the radical saint is an extremely important juncture in the history of art. Frescoes are meant to be seen from a distance, so this book provides a revelatory view of the minutiae and sophistication of Giotto's brushstrokes, which at times anticipates the future canon of mark marking in Western painting."

Artists’ Book

Buon Fresco

by Tacita Dean

Publisher
Release Place London, United Kingdom
Edition 1st edition
Release Date 2016
Credits
Editor: John Szarkowski
Artist: Tacita Dean
Identifiers
ISBN-13: 9781910164280
Work  
Topics Assisi, Frescoes, Giotto, San Francesco
Methods Photography
Language English
Format Hardcover
Dimensions 28.0 × 38.5 × 2.0 cm
Pages 112

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last updated 1389 days ago

Data Contributor: Artphilein Library, Christoph Schifferli

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