Gilberto Zorio  (Italian, 1944) 

Gilberto Zorio (Italian, b.1944) is a sculptor, installation, and Conceptual artist from Andorno Micca, Italy. He began his formal art training in 1963, when he attended the Accademia di Belle Arti to study painting, but soon abandoned it in favor of sculpture. In 1967, he had his first solo exhibition at the Galleria Sperone in Turin. His use of commonplace materials, such as incandescent electric light tubes, terracotta, lead, copper sulfate, salt, and tar, granted him inclusion in the Arte Povera movement in the 1960s, alongside contemporaries Jannis Kounellis (Greek, b.1936), Alighiero Boetti (Italian, 1940–1994), and Luciano Fabro (Italian, 1936–2007). The term Arte Povera was coined by the Italian art critic and curator Germano Celant, to describe the group of Italian artists whose use of unconventional materials and found objects functioned as a vehicle for radicalism against corporate power structures. Zorio was fascinated with the natural processes of alchemy and the discharge of energy, as illustrated in his 1970 installation Confine incandescente. Though it is considered to be among Zorio's most renowned works, it was rarely exhibited because the materials—incandescent nickel-chromium and electrical wires—were combustible. Zorio also commonly incorporated five-pointed stars, javelins, and canoe in his work, as evident in Stella per purificare le parole (1978). In addition to his participation in Arte Povera exhibitions, Zorio was included in the 1969 group exhibition Nine Young Artists: Theodoron Awards at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York. In 1979, Zorio held a solo exhibition at the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam and a retrospective at the Loggetta Lombardesca, Pinacoteca Comunale, in Ravenna. He had another important retrospective in 1985, at the Württembergischer Kunstverein, Stuttgart, which traveled to the Musée National d’Art Moderne in Paris. Most recently, Zorio was featured at the Dia Center in 2001. He currently lives and works in Turin, Italy.