Ordet is proud to present Il caso standard ©, the first exhibition showcasing the typewriter art made by Emilio Prini (1943-2016) from the late 1960s to the mid-1970s using an Olivetti 22 typewriter. Arising out of an encounter with the demon-engineer Barbatus or Barbus, who appeared to the artist in a Roman hotel room, these images, figures and studies are arranged in chronological order, and are based on the mathematical formulas, architectural relationships and poetical plans through which Prini intervened on the dimensions of space, time and existence. Variables, sets, areas, unknowns, infinitesimal, equivalent and adjacent, cycles, binaries, offcuts, values and partials are just some of the factors subject to study and speculation on Prini’s part.

The artworks are in turn accompanied by new birch panels–“standard” for Prini–which are examples of serial, industrial production, and “non-standard” surfaces made of Formica, cut in the 2:7 ratio explored in the artworks, which reveal the interactions between conformity and discord, subtraction and creation. The artist, who was the most enigmatic exponent of Arte Povera, makes use of the concepts of “standard” and “non-standard” as paradigms to exhibit models and subvert rules, pouring his energies into the search for non-random aesthetic proofs through a strategy based on wrong-footing and paradox.

The exhibition comes to a close with Formula ST/NS, which includes the code for the standard and non-standard developments. Starting with the first version in 1969, it was gradually enriched and elaborated before reaching its definitive form in 1979.

The exhibition is being staged in partnership with Timotea Austoni Prini.