Ettore Sordini retrospective opens at CRAC Puglia in Taranto

The CRAC Puglia in Taranto, part of the Fondazione Rocco Spani Onlus, is hosting the first Italian retrospective of Milanese painter Ettore Sordini (1934–2012), curated by Roberto Lacarbonara and Alberto Mazzacchera. The exhibition focuses on works from the 1960s and 1970s, tracing Sordini's pursuit of archetypal purity through minimal, rarefied mark-making. After joining the Movimento Nucleare in the vibrant creative milieu of 1950s Milan, Sordini befriended and studied under Lucio Fontana. Rejecting informalist tendencies and the influence of American Pop Art, Sordini developed a 'segnica' style characterized by extreme cleanliness of line and white backgrounds with germinal chromatic hints. His work embodies the 'minimal experimental symbolic' advocated by the Gruppo del Cenobio, which he co-founded in 1962 with friends from via San Carpoforo. This 'corrente segnica' was belatedly recognized by critics and stood in contrast to the nihilistic, hypercritical painting of his friend Piero Manzoni. The exhibition runs at CRAC Puglia, Taranto.