Art, Freedom, Innovation: Carla Accardi & Piero Dorazio

Works of art from the Italian avant-garde have long been among the highlights of Dorotheum‘s Contemporary Art auctions. Two canvases by Carla Accardi and Piero Dorazio demonstrate the vitality and innovative power of Gruppo Forma 1.

In the post-war artistic landscape, the Gruppo Forma 1 emerged as one of the most significant and innovative movements, redefining the boundaries of abstract art in Italy while engaging in dialogue with international avant-gardes. Founded in 1947 by a group of artists, critics, and intellectuals – including Carla Accardi, Piero Dorazio, Sanfilippo, and Turcato – the movement sought to overcome figurative conventions and explore an artistic language based on the purity of form, colour, and sign.

Carla Accardi and Piero Dorazio, despite their distinct artistic paths, shared a commitment to experimentation and formal purity, contributing significantly to the development of Italian abstract art and its international recognition. Their works stand as testimonies to an era of great creative ferment, where art became a vehicle for freedom and innovation.

Carla Accardi, with her vibrant and poetic painting, transformed the sign into a dynamic and vital element. Her work, initially in black and white, evolved towards bold chromaticism, an original synthesis of form, and continuous experimentation with materials and techniques. Her production reflects a constant investigation of pictorial language, balancing organic forms with geometric structures in an ever-evolving harmony.

Piero Dorazio was a pioneer of abstract painting, focusing on the decomposition of light and colour. His works, often built through intricate grids of lines and chromatic fields, create luminous weaves that evoke visual dynamism, partly anticipated by Balla’s experiments in the Compenetrazioni iridescenti. Dorazio, who frequently visited Balla at his home on via Oslavia in Rome, was among the first to recognize the innovative nature of the master’s studies, rediscovering his work between 1958 and 1960, a period when Balla’s name still suffered the damnatio memoriae of Futurism due to its association with Fascism. At that moment, Dorazio was on the verge of a breakthrough that, through his subsequent research, would take him beyond national borders, establishing a profound dialogue with overseas abstract movements such as Abstract Expressionism and Minimalism (one might think of Rothko, Stella, and Albers), thereby building a bridge between tradition and modernity.

The works of Carla Accardi and Piero Dorazio featured in our catalogue, provide an extraordinary glimpse into this revolutionary artistic period, attesting to the vitality and influence of Gruppo Forma 1 in redefining the language of contemporary painting. Through their canvases, one can perceive the echoes of an era in which art became a means of seeing and interpreting the world in a perfect synthesis of formal rigor and creative freedom.

Carla Accardi’s 1961 painting, which will be presented at our upcoming auction, is a perfect example of the artist’s stylistic maturation in the post-Forma 1 period. The work highlights her characteristic sign-based language, featuring a dynamic network of abstract, almost calligraphic forms interwoven against a vibrant chromatic background. The contrast between blue and red gives the piece a strong visual intensity, evoking a dialogue between structure and gestural freedom – where the sign becomes the primary element of composition, transforming into pure visual energy. The painting also reflects the artist’s interest in the flatness of the surface and the optical effects generated by colour layering, anticipating some of the experiments she would develop in later years with sicofoil.

Dorazio’s untitled artwork from 1962 constructed through an intricate web of vibrant lines and chromatic fields, becomes a visual texture that captures and refracts light, creating an optical dynamism that engages the viewer. He transforms geometric structure into a perceptual experience, demonstrating how abstraction can be both a rigorous and poetic masterpiece that encapsulates his commitment to a free and universal art.