Mario Schifano

Come per i celebri Paesaggi anemici, Schifano, nell' eseguire Per la strada ma tutto finto, ha utilizzato colori a smalto su fogli di carta da pacco incollati su tela. La composizione è qui stabilita da una struttura rettangolare ad angoli smussati che evoca la cornice assente e che stabilisce analogie con il telaio di una diapositiva o con lo schermo di un televisore: la televisione è la nostra finestra sul mondo come un tempo è stata la pittura e in passato prossimo la fotografia. Come si può notare dalla struttura dell’opera, l’artista ha riprodotto all’interno del riquadro della composizione una campagna tagliata da una strada - o forse proprio da un’autostrada -  dimostrando di essere consapevole della propria contemporaneità. Si noti, infatti, che quest'opera è databile nei primi anni Sessanta, periodo in cui ebbe termine la realizzazione dell’Autostrada del Sole, importante opera pubblica volta a rilanciare l’economia italiana nel secondo dopoguerra.
Negli anni che seguono, l’attenzione nei confronti della televisione aumenterà notevolmente tramutandosi in una sorta di ossessione artistica dell’artista.



Schifano in executing Per la strada ma tutto finto (on the road but everything is not real) uses enamels on wrapping paper laid on canvas, same technique he used for the well known 'Paesaggi Anemici' (anemic landscapes) In this case the composition is created by " a rectangular structure with rounded angles that evokes a missing frame, and presents analogies with the  stretcher of a photographic slide or the screen of a television: the television perceived as our window overlooking the world as in the past was the art of painting and in an upcoming future will be photography". As one can easily notice the  this work's composition focuses on a countryside cut by a motorway or most probably a highway, which underlies the artist's contemporaneity. As a matter of fact the work was executed in the first half of the Sixties when the Italian Autostrada del Sole, one of the most important public services realized after the Second World War was ended.
In the following years the attention Schifano pays to  television an increasing attention that turns it into one of his artistic obsessions.

Collezione M. Maggi/Raimondi, Roma
Ivi acquistato dall'attuale proprietario

Mosca, Casa Centrale dell'Artista; Leningrado, Sala Centrale delle Esposizioni, Orientamenti dell'Arte Italiana, Roma 1947-89, 1989, p. 111, illustrato
Milano, Fondazione Marconi, Schifano 1960-1964. Dal monocromo alla strada, 2005, p. 175, illustrato

Marco Goldin, Achille Bonito Oliva, Mario Schifano, Opere 1957-1997, Milano 1998, p. 75, illustrato

This work appears to be in generally good overall condition. There are 2 pressure marks towards the upper left margin. There is a small craquelure with a tear towards the upper right corner and 1 craquelure towards the center of the upper margin. There are traces of wearing and of light waving along the edges. There is a trace of humidity along the lower left edge visible in the catalogue illustration. There are minor traces of retouching over the "R" of the word "STRADA" visible under UV light.
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