Giulio Paolini (1940) - Elea

Giulio Paolini, born in Genoa on 5 November 1940, is considered among the greatest artists in the world of conceptual art. He was awarded an Honorary Doctorate a few days ago (January 22, 2026) by the Brera Academy, and a few years earlier (2022) he was granted the title Artist of the Year by the prestigious Imperial Prize from the Emperor of Japan: the highest recognition in the field of contemporary world art.

plaster cast, plexiglass plate, lithography on die-cut cardboard
Copy: height 14.5 cm, plate Ø 47 cm, lithograph 33 x 41 cm, overall dimensions 15 x 47 x 47 cm
150 copies in Arabic numerals and 15 artist's proofs
Artist's proof number 10/15
Bank of Italian Switzerland, Lugano
Published in the Catalogue raisonné of Giulio Paolini's works.


The plaster bust of the Greek philosopher Parmenides is placed on a slab of
Circular Plexiglas that holds a shaped photographic image – how
It would consist of two circles offset from each other—laid, in turn, on a sheet.
White bearing a linear trace. The printed image reproduces a sky.
nocturne with planetary motifs and with the repeated image of the face of
Parmenide, rotated by 45 degrees each time, so that the cast seems
orbiting in outer space.
In the artist's words: “Elea, an ancient Greek colony – a name that today does not
designates some place – it was located on the Cilento coast nearby
of the present-day city of Salerno: it was the seat of the Eleatic School, pre-Socratic philosophy
which had Parmenides as its principal exponent. The image that here
It evokes her, far from any territorial reference, and alludes to light-years.
pierced by the figures of Time: the face of Parmenides seems to reappear
and to see oneself in the negative reflection situated among the celestial bodies

Giulio Paolini, born in Genoa on 5 November 1940, is considered among the greatest artists in the world of conceptual art. He was awarded an Honorary Doctorate a few days ago (January 22, 2026) by the Brera Academy, and a few years earlier (2022) he was granted the title Artist of the Year by the prestigious Imperial Prize from the Emperor of Japan: the highest recognition in the field of contemporary world art.