oil on canvas applied on cardboard, 62×51 cm
signed and dated top left U. Conti 1914
Created immediately after Conti's encounter with Futurism at the 1913 Florentine exhibition, this still life is a miracle of balance between innovation and tradition, an example of the innate sense of perfection and mastery of one's own means that underpinned Conti's path.
The detail of the newspaper peeking out from behind the glass, the balanced spoon, the shadow of the bottle—everything appears crystalline, stereometric, and immaterial; every touch is as if suspended in the air, yet imprinted so clearly on our eyes that it awakens a wholly intellectual pleasure in the competition that sight establishes with the air, penetrating the invisible.
