Documentary on de Chirico and Paolini to screen at MAXXI

A documentary titled "Il viandante e la sua ombra" (The Wanderer and His Shadow) explores the artistic lineage between Giorgio de Chirico and Giulio Paolini. Directed by Gabriele and Raffaele Simongini, the film will premiere on Tuesday, December 19, 2023, at the MAXXI auditorium in Rome, marking the 45th anniversary of de Chirico's death. It will later air on Rai Cultura via Rai5. The documentary traces the first encounter between the two artists in 1958, when a 17-year-old Paolini attended a lecture by de Chirico at Palazzo Carignano in Turin, where de Chirico attacked modern art. Initially shocked, Paolini later developed deep admiration for de Chirico, whom he calls his "illustrious model." The film posits that this moment seeded a conceptual transformation of de Chirico's metaphysics in Paolini's work. Both artists share themes of the painting as theater and time—enigmatic in de Chirico, annulled in Paolini. The work "Autoritratto nudo" (2014) visually encapsulates this doppelgänger relationship, with de Chirico's image inside Paolini's silhouette. Filmed in Turin and Rome, the documentary incorporates archival footage from Franco Simongini's earlier documentaries on both artists. Paolini himself appears behind the camera and closes the film reflecting on timelessness and eternal return.