Volume A Moduli Sfasati, 1960

Wall object on die-cut transparent plastic canvas

Dimensions: 50 x 50 cm

After meeting Piero Manzoni, who became a lifelong friend, the artist turned to the Milan avant-garde in 1958 and created her first series of works, the Volumi - perforated canvases similar to Fontana's Buchi. Dadamaino also counted Lucio Fontana and Yves Klein among her models. Fascinated by movement, she created a series of optically dynamic objects before 1970. Later she changed the direction of her work and used invented signs and letter-like symbols. She created the series L'Alfabeto della mente and the cycle I fatti della vita, which was first shown in a solo exhibition at the Venice Biennale.

Dadamaino completed medical studies before turning to art in the late 1950s. She followed Lucio Fontana and the Spatialism movement, and in 1959 she became a member of the group Azimuth (founded by Bonalumi, Castellani and Manzoni), which had links with the groups Zero in Germany, Nul in the Netherlands, and Motus in France. In 1961, on the occasion of an exhibition in Holland, her name was misspelled as one word, Dadamaino. From 1963-64 she adopted this as her artist's name. Dadamaino's work can be seen in collections such as the Tate, London and the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation, Venice. In 1980 and 1990, solo exhibitions were dedicated to her at the Venice Biennale.