Roberto Crippa biography

Roberto Crippa was an Italian painter and sculptor. He was born in Monza on May 7, 1921. He studied at the Brera Academy of Fine Arts under the guidance of Aldo Carpi, Carlo Carrà, and Achille Funi. Early in his painting career, he was influenced by neocubism and in 1947 held his first solo exhibition at the Bergamini Gallery in Milan.
In 1950 he became friends with Lucio Fontana and joined Spatialism, which also included Gian Carozzi, Giorgio Kaisserlian, Beniamino Joppolo, Milena Milani, Sergio Dangelo, Carlo Cardazzo, Cesare Peverelli. From this period is the series of paintings called Spirals, abstract and geometric in nature, in which the artist created involute spaces from which rays ideally projected out of the two-dimensionality of the canvas. In 1951, Roberto Crippa reached New York, where he met surrealists Max Ernst, Victor Brauner, and Yves Tanguy and exhibited at the gallery of Alexander Iolas.
Between 1954 and 1956 the spirals changed into heavier, incisive, and involute forms, interlaced with each other better known as Totem. From 1955 onwards, he dedicated himself to producing the so-called Collage, that is polymaterial paintings in which he initially used iron, bronze, and steel and later cork, bark, and wood, inspired by a primitive symbolism. In 1956 he participated in the Venice Biennale as well as various group exhibitions in Tokyo, Hiroshima, Amsterdam, and Madrid.
In 1962 he was the victim of a flight accident that forced him to use a wheelchair for almost a year. After recovering from the accident, he began painting landscapes, Landscape, using a polymaterial technique and his usual abstract style. Also from this period are the Amiantiti, works made with thin sheets of asbestos applied to an engraved board.
Roberto Crippa died in 1972 when he crashed his plane near Bresso airport during a flight preparing for the World Championships.