"Un teatro di idee drammatizzate" Giulio Paolini e le scenografie per l'opera di Wagner

The work of the artist Giulio Paolini (Genoa 1940), one of the protagonists of Arte Povera, has an intrinsic theatrical vocation since the Sixties. The critic Tommaso Trini has called his work "a theater of dramatized ideas". The conceptual matrix, the reflection on the art making, the opening to classical culture and, above all, the continuous dialogue of his painting and installations with the spatial dimension, have to do with the world of the scene.\r\nTherefore, the collaboration with the stage in classical and modern theatrical performances is almost a constant in his artistic work since 1969, when he realized the scenes and costumes for Vittorio Alfieri's Brutus at the Carignano Theater in Turin. His scenographies for the opera are also of high quality, in which Paolini fully achieves the goal of the total work of art. \r\nMy contribution has the aim to focus in particular on two Giulio Paolini’s collaborations for the Wagner’opera: the scenes for Die Walkürie (2005) and for the Parsifal (2007), produced by the Teatro San Carlo of Naples for the direction of Federico Tiezzi.\r\nIn Paolini’s work the value of tradition and history are pivotal. The artist also for his set designs uses these same elements. For this reason, the artist faces Wagner, on the first hand respecting the theatrical "tradition", on the second hand renewing it in an original, even disruptive way. \r\nThe paper intends to present this particular aspect of his work for the opera theatre, bringing out the concept of the eternity of the Classic and Museum, already present in Paolini’s art work, in comparison with the Wagnerian message.