Collection: Michael Zaza

Born in Molfetta in 1948, Michele Zaza moved to Milan to attend the Brera Academy, graduating in 1970. In a period dominated by the objectivist tensions of Arte Povera and the analytical rigor of Conceptualism, Zaza chose a solitary and profoundly introspective path. His research does not focus on the exterior, on current events or raw materials, but rather turns inward, toward a "family mythology" that becomes the key to understanding the entire universe. Beginning in the early 1970s, Zaza transformed the domestic space into a ritual temple. The involvement of his parents (his mother and father) in his photographic sequences has no affective or documentary purpose; they become priestly icons, actors in a secular liturgy that celebrates the connection between earth and heaven. Landmark works such as Cristologia (1972) and Mimesi (1975) use primordial elements—bread, earth, cotton wool—to construct a narrative that transcends reality. Bread is not food, but a symbol of existence; earth is origin and destiny. One of the most distinctive elements of Zaza's production is the use of white pigment spread across the face. This "masking" operation serves not to hide, but to reveal a timeless identity. By covering his own face or that of his parents in white, Zaza erases historical and personal contingencies to allow being to emerge in its ontological purity. It is a reference to classical statuary and, at the same time, an evocation of a dreamlike and abstract dimension, where the human body becomes the architecture of thought. Towards the end of the 1970s, Zaza's research opened up to an even broader spatiality. With series such as Naufragio euclideo (1977), the artist investigates the failure of rational logic in the face of infinity. In the following years, his conceptual palette was enriched: the transition from the rigorous black and white of his early works to a pictorial and symbolic management of colour (blue, red, gold) marked the arrival of a cosmic dimension. The "Inhabited Sky" becomes the place of the soul, where the photographic image becomes a visual prayer and a search for a lost harmony between the human and the divine. Michele Zaza's intellectual rigor led him to participate in the most important international exhibitions. Invited to the 5th Paris Biennale (1967) at a very young age, he consolidated his fame with his participation in the Venice Biennale (1980, 2011) and Documenta 6 in Kassel (1977). His works are now preserved in the sanctuaries of contemporary art, from the Centre Pompidou in Paris to the Tate Modern in London, testifying to a language that, despite originating in a small village in Southern Italy, has been able to speak a universal, metaphysical and profoundly necessary language.