Oil on canvas, 1960. 765x890 mm; 30 1/4x35 1/4 inches. Signed and dated in oil, lower left recto; titled and annotated in ink on the stretcher verso.
Provenance: Private collection, New York.
Bartolomucci (1923-1996) was an Italian painter from Abruzzo in southern Italy. After studying art in and around his hometown of Barisciano, he moved to Rome, by way of Rimini, settling there around 1950 and during the mid-1950s became one of the founders of Astralism. In 1960, Bartolomucci moved to New York where he remained for two years and worked from a studio at Carnegie Hall. He painted an imagined scene of the first moon landing during his time in New York, preceding the actual event by nearly ten years, which was exhibited in Washington, D.C., reproduced in American newspapers and acquired by the John F. Kennedy presidential collection. Bartolomucci also became deeply influenced by Abstract Expressionism during his sojourn in New York; the style stuck with him throughout the rest of his career (he returned to Rome in 1963 and worked there until his death in 1996) albeit combined with a figural and representational edge.
