MAURIZIO CATTELAN | Mini-Me

Massimo de Carlo, Milan
Private Collection, New York
Giraud Pissarro Segalot, New York
Acquired from the above by the present owner

Kunsthalle Basel, Maurizio Cattelan 30/1999, October - November 1999, cat. no. 5, n.p., illustrated in color (another example exhibited)
New York, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, Maurizio Cattelan: All, November 2011 - January 2012, cat. no. 69, pp. 76 and 219, illustrated in color (another example exhibited)
Monnaie de Paris, Maurizio Cattelan. Not Afraid of Love, October 2016 - January 2017 (another example exhibited)

Giorgio Verzotti, Maurizio Cattelan, Milan 1999, p. 47, illustrated in color (another example illustrated)
Francesco Bonami, Nancy Spector and Barbara Vanderlinden, Maurizio Cattelan, London 2000, p. 125, illustrated in color (another example illustrated)
Francesco Bonami, Nancy Spector, Barbara Vanderlinden and Massimiliano Gioni, Maurizio Cattelan, London 2003, p. 139, illustrated in color (another example illustrated)

This work is in very good condition overall. All elements are present and intact. There is evidence of light wear seen in the hands. Under raking light and close inspection, the painted surface of the fingers is slightly uneven, inherent to the artist's working method. The clothing is slightly worn, again inherent. Under Ultraviolet light inspection, there is no evidence of restoration.
In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective qualified opinion.
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Maurizio Cattelan’s Mini-Me is from an edition of 10 miniature sculptures made in 1999. Each work depicts Cattelan in his own image, in an assortment of action-figure sized manifestations. While each edition bears similar resemblance to the artist, they are all clothed differently, based on different imitations of the Cattelan's garments. Cattelan was propelled to international fame following his inclusion in the Italian Pavilion at the 47^th Venice Biennale in 1997. There, he displayed his work Tourists, which saw a multitude of pigeons perched on ceiling pipes, gazing over visitors as they meandered the space below. Wielding a bemused expression, Mini-Me’s raised brow eludes to an air of antagonistic judgment. Its perching, omniscient stance is reminiscent of Cattelan’s aforementioned work and suggests the continuation of an inquiry into the duality of being completely embedded in something on the one hand, while being starkly removed from it on the other. This duality was felt by Cattelan throughout his childhood, where his strict Roman Catholic upbringing cemented feelings of estrangement and separation from global events. Born in Padua, Italy in 1960, Cattelan’s Italian heritage is central to his work. He has been linked to the Italian-bred Art Povera movement for his unconventional approaches to material and conceptual audacity—an association that he is enamored by, but ultimately refutes. Despite not belonging exclusively to an Italian artistic tradition, Cattelan is displaced due to his insular battle between a contemporary reality and a collective nostalgia for the traditional notion of Italy that no longer exists. Cattelan states: “This is why nomadism is so important today; not only does it provide a constant reminder of what being an outsider feels like, but it helps you to return home and see the places you live with re-opened eyes” (the artist in conversation with Robert Nickas in Francesco Bonami, Nancy Spector and Barbara Vanderlinden, Maurizio Cattelan, London 2000, p. 132). Growing up in middle-class Italy, Cattelan was at once naïve to the social changes of the larger world, yet today works within the complex global hybridity of present culture. His 2008 work, Daddy-Daddy, depicts a life-size sculpture of Disney’s 1997 animation Pinocchio. Operating at a distance from his peers, the puppet's filmic quest is to become ‘a real boy.' In Cattelan’s rendition—in a cruel twist of fate—Pinocchio is seen lying face down in a pool of water as though he has fallen in and drowned. Presented for the first time in the 2008 exhibition, theanyspacewhatsoever, at the Guggenheim Museum in New York, Daddy-Daddy can be viewed in parallel to Cattelan’s Mini-Me renditions of himself. Both sculptures share a strong Italian heritage, a large nose and a supercharged ego coupled with a sense of existential angst.

In a nod to another staple movie of 1990s, the work’s title Mini-Me bears reference to the spy movie parody Austin Powers and particularly references the small malevolent clone of the villain, Dr. Evil. Here, Cattelan’s own Mini-Me doppelganger embodies the shared roguish charisma for which both Dr. Evil and the artist are known. Notorious for his outlandish nature and instinct towards replication, Cattelan explores self-hood through the guise of humility, referencing himself as a troublemaker. While Cattelan’s highly conceptual sculptures can at first be striking, the artist does not see them at provocateurs. He states: “I actually think that reality is far more provocative than my art…I’m always borrowing pieces—crumbs really—of everyday reality. If you think my work is very provocative, it means that reality is extremely provocative, and we just don’t react to it” (Ibid, p. 17).

Conceptual grandeur is vast throughout Cattelan’s practice. Once the immediacy of encountering a work has faded, audiences are invited to explore the pools of abstract meaning that have influenced their creation. Despite a trajectory of individual and context specific sculptural endeavors, ‘the self’ is a theme that Cattelan unusually returned to repeatedly. His whimsical self-portraits are at once self-deprecating and aggrandizing. As such, Mini Me is an important emblem of Cattelan’s inner consciousness. Although his public persona is that of a charming boisterous troublemaker, his work on a serious level endures as a manifestation of his innermost thoughts. Mini-Me suggests a certain existential anxiety, not just for Cattelan himself, but also a generalized societal apprehension as seen in society. Cattelan's refreshing awareness of the politics and absurdities of the modern world establishes itself in artworks that provide new perspectives on contextualizing oneself in relation to contemporary debate and global politics.