Large Wall Panels by Stefano Damico, Italy, 1974, Set of 3

Set of 3 large wall panels by Italian sculptor Stefano d'Amico (varying in width from 86 to 92 cm.) in ash and brass designed and dated, 1974. There is not so much known about D'Amico's work apart from that he held expositions in Milan and Genova in the late 1960s and that he was a sculptor, born on Sicily. We found him in a book and his other work is also interesting and shows quite some resemblance with this work. These particular cabinets were custom made for a house in Venice, where they come from. This set of wall panels was made with a lot of care and precision: the little ash cubes are dead straight and the strips have all been attached separately with a single nail (or two) and some glue to the bigger motherboard. Together they create a spectacle for the eye with so much to see for those who like this kind of brutalist and literally cubistic style of surface patterning. It's almost impossible to discover some sort of returning pattern or systematic order in these art works because there is no system at all in the positioning of the cubes, which may squeeze a bit (but can be very pleasant at times). Somehow, it very much resembles the bigger city landscaping with enormous building blocks and railways or rivers, giving them a brutalist twist (without the concrete) In the evening when it's darker and the cabinet are in a spotlight you will be amazed by what the city-scaping structure can do with shadows. It's very playful and it just gives them just the bit extra. The light colored wood bounces the light off very well creating lighter and darker spaces on the total surface, making the shadow alley's a bit obscure too. There are some interesting characteristics in these cabinets such as the darker coloured stripes that run all the way down in between two lighter ones. The bottom of the sideboard is totally covered with brass. D'Amico has chosen his different colours of brown very pleasantly if you take a look at the total appearance of this piece with the darker brown on the sides and the top and the lighter brown in the frontpanels. If you open the sideboard a pleasant and fresh wood smell is welcoming you and you can see directly that also the inner part has been taken care after well with nice flames in the wood and made with great eye for detail, such as the closing mechanism and gold colored hinges that still work very well almost 50 years after these pieces were made. It definitely most have cost him a lot of time and effort to put this all together so Stefano d'Amico was definitely a man with a lot of patience and persistence.