MAURIZIO CATTELAN

Cattelan has held major exhibitions worldwide, including a major retrospective at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, in which his artworks hung in a chaotic, all-encompassing installation. Cattelan employs subversion and wit to interrogate various conditions of the contemporary world, from authority, history, and religion to the production of art and the notion of the artist.

Early Years

Maurizio Cattelan was born in Padua, Italy, to a working-class family and grew up in modest circumstances. He initially trained in industrial and technical fields, working various jobs such as gardener, waiter, and furniture maker before transitioning to art. Self-taught and skeptical of traditional art education, Cattelan has always regarded practical experience and ‘making shows’ as his true teachers. He has been based in Milan and New York, cities central to his artistic life and practice.

Maurizio Cattelan Artworks

Maurizio Cattelan’s contemporary artworks are characterised by subversive humour, irony, and conceptual boldness. He uses a diverse range of materials—from wax and gold to living figures—and often engages public figures and art world participants in surprising ways.

Early Conceptual Gestures

• Torno Subito (Be Back Soon) (1989): For his first solo exhibition, Cattelan installed only a sign, avoiding actual artworks and satirising art exhibition conventions.
• Una Domenica a Rivara (1992): Cattelan staged an ‘escape’ by hanging knotted bedsheets from a window during a group show, creating the illusion he had fled his exhibition.
• Working is a Bad Job (1993, 45th Venice Biennale): Cattelan filled his exhibition space with scented air from a perfume company, further challenging art’s expectations.

Subverting the Art World

• Stadium (1991): Cattelan addressed xenophobia in Italy by creating a football team of North African migrant workers, who played on a giant table, combining performance, social critique, and spectacle.
• Errotin, le vrai Lapin (1995): Gallerist Emmanuel Perrotin wore a rabbit costume to Cattelan’s opening, flipping the roles of artist and dealer.
• A Perfect Day (1999): Massimo De Carlo, a gallerist, was duct-taped to his own gallery wall.

Notorious Sculptures

• La Nona Ora (The Ninth Hour) (1999): A hyperreal resin sculpture of Pope John Paul II struck by a meteorite, provoking debate on power, faith, and suffering.
• Him (2001): A kneeling wax figure resembling a praying child, but—when viewed from the front—revealing the face of Adolf Hitler, forcing stark confrontation with themes of innocence, evil, and history.
• La Rivoluzione siamo noi (2000): A polyester resin sculpture of Cattelan, with an oversized head, hanging limply from a coat rack, satirically referencing both artists’ egos and existential doubt.
• Daddy, Daddy (2008): Disney’s Pinocchio floats face down, referencing lies, failure, and self-mythology.
• Comedian (2019): A banana duct-taped to a wall at Art Basel Miami Beach, symbolising absurdity and art world excess; widely publicised when a performance artist ate it.
• America (2016): A fully functional solid gold toilet, first installed at the Guggenheim Museum and later stolen from Blenheim Palace—testing ideas of luxury, public access, and the absurdity of value.

Key Themes

Cattelan’s works question the very production of art, the power dynamics within galleries and institutions, and the public perception of artists. He often satirises his own persona, as in La Rivoluzione siamo noi and Daddy, Daddy, playfully interrogating ideas of artistic identity and fraudulence.

Select Public Commissions

• L.O.V.E., marble sculpture with only the middle finger intact, Piazza Affari, Milan.
• Hollywood replica, placed on a rubbish tip in Palermo for the Venice Biennale.

Select Awards and Accolades

• Quadriennale Prize, Rome (2009)
• Arnold-Bode Prize, Kunstverein Kassel, Germany (2005)
• Honorary degree in Sociology, University of Trento, Italy (2004)
• Honorary Professorship in Sculpture, Accademia di Belle Arti di Carrara (2018)

Exhibitions

Maurizio Cattelan has been featured in solo and group exhibitions at major institutions worldwide since the 1980s.

Solo Exhibitions

• 2024: The Third Hand, Moderna Museet, Stockholm
• 2021: Breath Ghosts Blind, Fondazione Pirelli HangarBicocca, Milan
• 2021: The Last Judgment, UCCA Center for Contemporary Art, Beijing
• 2019: Victory is Not an Option, Blenheim Palace, Oxfordshire, England
• 2016: Not Afraid of LOVE, La Monnaie de Paris
• 2014: Cosa Nostra, Venus Over Manhattan, New York
• 2013: Kaputt, Fondation Beyeler, Switzerland
• 2012: Amen, Center for Contemporary Art, Ujazdowski Castle, Warsaw
• 2011: All, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York

Group Exhibitions

• 2024: Venice Biennale, Vatican Pavilion, Italy
• 2021: Arcimbolo Face to Face, Centre Pompidou, Metz, France
• 2020: (SELF) PORTRAITS, Parkett, Zurich
• 2019: La Source, Fondation Carmignac, Île de Porquerolles, France
• 2018: The Artist is Present, Yuz Museum, Shanghai
• 2015: Picasso Mania, Grand Palais, Paris
• 2015: Storylines: Contemporary Art at the Guggenheim, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum
• 2012: Americna Exuberance, Rubell Family Collection, Miami
• 2011: Venice Biennale, ILLUMInazioni

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Ocula | 2025