Tino Stefanoni (1937-2017)

The Object for the Mind.
Tino Stefanoni spent fifty years refining a visual language that sits on the razor's edge between Conceptualism and pure painting. He did not paint objects; he painted the idea of objects.

In Senza titolo D18 (1994), the everyday is reduced to a sacred sign. Stefanoni strips away all narrative noise, leaving only a balance of rationality and lyricism. As the artist famously asserted: "Painting is an object for the mind, just as a chair is an object for the body."

Why it matters: A textbook example of Italian conceptual painting. The work comes with impeccable credentials: it was exhibited at the Villa Manzoni and is archived in the artist's Catalogue Raisonné. It is a piece of intellectual silence, perfectly executed.