Skip to main content
Want more images or videos?
Request additional images or videos from the seller
1 of 9

Silvana Cenci
Italian Silvana Cenci Signed Mid Century Modern Steel Gold Explosion Sculpture

About the Item

Silvana Cenci, internationally renowned explosive sculptor, died October 1, 2000 at her home in Gray. Ms. Cenci, who was born in Florence, Italy, before World War II, married Stuart Church and moved to the U.S. permanently in 1959. She lived in Boston for many years, where she was a founder of the Brookline Art Center and a founding member of Summerthing. She exhibited widely throughout Europe and the U.S., and her work is in many museums and public and private collections. After moving to the States, Ms. Cenci began working with new technologies from the aircraft industry, and with explosives. She moved to Northwood, NH, in the early 60s, and pursued and perfected her revolutionary experimentation with explosive sculpture in stainless steel. A native of Italy, she lived most of her life in America where she became internationally known, primarily for using dynamite to blast images into stainless steel and finishing some pieces with pure gold. The pieces created with dynamite were often utilized by architects. One piece titled “Wheels in Motion” hung in Boston’s South Station. Education and Training Accademia di Belle Arti, Florence, Italy Academie de la Grande Chaumiere, Paris Lewis and Clark College, Portland, Oregon Selected Individual Exhibitions Galleria Numero, Florence, Italy Galleria San Carlo, Naples, Italy Galleria d'Arte Totti, Milan, Italy Galeria Beno, Zurich, Switzerland Nova Gallery, Boston Weeden Gallery, Boston Capricorn Gallery, New York City Roach-Hoffman Gallery, Naples, Florida Bristol Art Museum, Bristol, Rhode Island, retrospective Frank Tanzer Gallery, Boston Symphony Hall, Boston Musica Viva, Cambridge, Massachusetts Los Llanos Gallery, Santa Fe, New Mexico Northern Arizona University, Flagstaff Selected Group Exhibitions "Oregon Artists," Lincoln County Art Center, Lincoln, Oregon "Exhibition of Painting and Sculpture," Henry Art Gallery, Seattle, Washington "West Coast Sculptors," Portland Art Museum, Portland, Oregon "Mostra Nazionale del Bianco e Nero," Museo Civico Castello Urasino, Catania, Italy "New England Art Today," Northwestern University, Boston "New England Sculptors Association," Boston City Hall, Boston "Silvana Cenci and Calvin Libby," Bristol Art Museum, Bristol, Rhode Island "Adele Seronde and Silvana Cenci," Weeden Gallery, Boston "Contemporary Italian Art-Italian Heritage," Boston City Hall, Boston, catalog "Explosion of Form, Color, Imagination: Works by Silvana Cenci Selected Awards First Honorable Mention, "Design in Transit," Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority Competition, Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston, Massachusetts Research in Creative Art Grant, Blanche E. Colman Foundation, Boston, Massachusetts Statue of Victory, World Culture Prize for Letters, Arts and Sciences, Centro Studi e Ricerche delle Nazioni, Salsomaggiore Terme, Italy Harvard-pedigreed architect Harlow Carpenter built the Bundy in 1962. The venue's first decade was lively with exhibitions that featured a large cast of artists, including Dino Basaldella, Judith Brown, Silvana Cenci, Xavier Corbero, Ivanhoe Fortier and Louise Nevelson. In a catalog for one such show, in 1963, Carpenter wrote that he envisioned the Bundy Center for the Arts (as he called it then) as "a country museum where space would be an inherent commodity and painting and sculpture could be viewed leisurely against a Vermont landscape." Silvana Cenci created unique sculptures and wall-reliefs by blasting metal with high-powered explosives. She stated: "I feel a direct involvement with the material--the explosion is immediate, and yet controlled, violent and exact." Cenci studied art at the Accademia di Belle (Florence, Italy, 1946), the Academie de la Grande Chaumiere (Paris, France, 1949) and Lewis and Clark College (Portland, Oregon, 1951). She exhibited widely, including at the Bristol Art Museum (Bristol, Rhode Island), the Symphony Hall (Boston, MA) and Northern Arizona University (Flagstaff, AZ). Her work is included in several public collections, including the collections of the Colonnade Hotel (Boston, MA), the Galleria d'Arte Moderna (Florence, Italy), the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (Boston, MA), and the Milhouse-Bundy Performing and Fine Arts Center (Waitsfield, VT). In 1974, Cenci received a Research in Creative Art Grant from the Blanche Colman Foundation (Boston, MA). Cenci lived in Sedona Arzona in the 1970s and early 1980s. This sculpture was formed by explosion and a liquid gold wash was added. The material has a unique ability to gather light and interesting dimensions are formed as the light bounces around it. Structurally the sculpture is very strong. The vast majority of her work is either in museums or private collections. Regarding her use of dynamite, nitroglycerin and TNT explosives in making art, Cenci said: "It is simultaneously conception and birth, and if I am not pleased with the result, well then, I do not have to reject months of labor.". Selected Bibliography Brolin, Brent C. and Jean Richards. Sourcebook of Architectural Ornament: Designers, Craftsmen, Manufacturers and Distributors of Custom and Ready-Made Exterior Ornament. New York: Van Nostrand Reinhold, 1982. Cooper, Ed. "Cenci Sculptures at Nova." The Christian Science Monitor (Tuesday, November 21, 1961) p. 7, illus. Hughes, John A. "Explosion in Northwood." New Hampshire Profiles vol. 13 no. 6 (June 1964) pp. 38-39, 56, illus.
  • Creator:
    Silvana Cenci (1926 - 2000, Italian)
  • Dimensions:
    Height: 28.88 in (73.36 cm)Width: 28.88 in (73.36 cm)
  • Medium:
  • Movement & Style:
  • Period:
  • Condition:
    minor wear commensurate with age and technique.
  • Gallery Location:
    Surfside, FL
  • Reference Number:
    1stDibs: LU38212376102
More From This SellerView All
  • Modernist Sculpture Figural Portrait Bust Brutalist Wire Work
    By Irving George Lehman
    Located in Surfside, FL
    This piece is unsigned. Irving Lehman (1900-1983) was an American Jewish painter, sculptor, engraver, and designer. Born in Kiev in then Russia, Lehman studied at the Art Students League, Cooper Union and the National Academy of Art and spent much of his working life in New York City. Part of the Abstract Expressionist school, he worked in oil and watercolor as a painter and in metal and steel as a sculptor; his works have been shown in galleries in England, France, Italy, Israel and Japan, and were included in an international traveling exhibition in Europe in 1951. Like many other artists of his generation, he painted for the WPA and then adopted a more abstract style after WWII. Lehman spent much of his career in NYC. He had his first exhibition at ACA Gallery in 1934. He also exhibited at the Whitney, National Academy, PAFA, Brooklyn Museum, Chicago Art Institute, and others. This work contains Constructivist elements anticipating the more gestural abstraction of the post-WWII New York Abstract Expressionist School. Member of American Art Congress, worked near Woodstock and in Columbia County...
    Category

    Mid-20th Century Modern Abstract Sculptures

    Materials

    Steel

  • Gold Gilt Bronze Sculpture Necklace Art Israeli Tumarkin Abstract Surrealist
    Located in Surfside, FL
    Measures about 4 X 3.75 inches. Box frame is 17 X 13 inches. Signed by artist verso. From the literature that I have seen I believe the edition size was limited to 10, I do not know ...
    Category

    1960s Modern Abstract Sculptures

    Materials

    Gold, Bronze

  • Gold Gilt Bronze Sculpture Pendant Israeli Tumarkin Abstract Modernist Jewelry
    Located in Surfside, FL
    Measures about 4.25 X 2.25 inches. Box frame is 17 X 13 inches. Signed by artist verso. From the literature that I have seen I believe the edition size was limited to 10, I do not kn...
    Category

    1960s Modern Abstract Sculptures

    Materials

    Gold, Bronze

  • Gold Gilt Bronze Sculpture Brooch Art Israeli Tumarkin Abstract Surrealist
    Located in Surfside, FL
    Measures about 4 X 3.75 inches. Box frame is 17 X 13 inches. Signed by artist verso. From the literature that I have seen I believe the edition size was limited to 10, I do not know ...
    Category

    1960s Modern Abstract Sculptures

    Materials

    Gold, Bronze

  • 1970s French Brutalist Welded Steel and Raw Mineral Specimen Sculpture Signed
    By Jacques Lerebourg
    Located in Surfside, FL
    Jacques Lerebourg hand made abstract metal sculpture in welded and polished metal with inclusion of a natural quartz or crystal mineral specimen. part of a distinguished group of Fre...
    Category

    1970s Arte Povera Abstract Sculptures

    Materials

    Steel

  • Brutalist Abstract Sculpture, Gilded Steel and Bronze James Bearden American Mod
    By James Bearden
    Located in Surfside, FL
    Wall-hanging sculpture: blackened steel, fused bronze, solvent dyes, abstract form, USA; Signed; 20 x 8 x 3 1/4 Suggesting archaeological artifacts from the future, these sculptures and functional pieces have been described as post-apocalyptic and brutalist in style, and they’re capturing the attention of collectors and galleries across the country. Bearden was born in Alabama but grew up in Des Moines and received bachelor’s degrees in fine art and visual communications from Grand View University. He worked in graphic design for 20 years, most of that time as an award-winning art director at Flynn Wright advertising agency. In 2007, at the age of 43, he decided to leave that job and focus on fine art. A longtime painter, Bearden found himself drawn to sculpture. The work of Pablo Picasso, Harry Bertoia, Alexander Calder and Louise Nevelson particularly inspired him. His early pieces were smooth, abstract shapes made from wire and sheets of steel painted with bright colors, evoking pop art. That felt like a dead end, he says, so he went in the opposite direction, building both organic and architectonic forms encrusted with craggy texture and charred, corroded or patinated finishes. In 2012 Bearden entered his first public art competition. His sculpture, Paths Unite, was accepted for Clive’s Art Along the Trail and then purchased for the city’s permanent collection. He also has outdoor sculptures at Blank Park Zoo and Lowe Art Center in Marion, as well as in Ames, Coralville and Plymouth, Minnesota. Rago auction brought Bearden’s sculptures to the attention of Larry Weinberg, owner of Weinberg Modern in New York. Weinberg began collecting Bearden’s work for himself and his gallery. This past winter, he curated a solo show of Bearden’s sculptures and functional pieces at 1stdibs Gallery in the New York Design Center. Weinberg compares Bearden’s style to the brutalist furniture of Paul Evans (1931-1987), a midcentury modern craftsman described as “the father of the modern art-furniture movement.” Brutalism as an architectural style emerged after World War II and was characterized by the use of rough concrete as the primary building material. The term has been revived in the past few years to apply to a raw, un-prettified approach to web design as well as to the 1960s-1970s interior design aesthetic that emphasized rugged textures, distressed metals, unfinished concrete and industrial materials. He went on to create cabinet-like boxes that he categorized as Dwelling Boxes, Harry Boxes (a tribute to the late sculptor and modern furniture designer Harry Bertoia), Barnacle Boxes...
    Category

    21st Century and Contemporary Abstract Sculptures

    Materials

    Bronze, Steel

You May Also Like
  • "Makaha" (Metal) Sculpture- mid century modern, modernism, monochrome
    By Scott Troxel
    Located in Marmora, NJ
    "Makaha (Metal)" is a fun modernist freestanding sculpture that brings bold statement to wherever it is placed. Made from .25" thick powder coated mild steel, it is vibrant and durable and can be used both inside and outside (powder coated is weather resistant). The color is a retro teal (Even though it appears almost bright blue in the bright sun photos...
    Category

    2010s Modern Abstract Sculptures

    Materials

    Steel

  • "Reef Club" Metal Sculpture- steel, mid century modern, modernism, monochrome
    By Scott Troxel
    Located in Marmora, NJ
    "Reef Club" is a fun modernist freestanding sculpture that brings bold statement to wherever it is placed. Made from .25" thick powder coated mild steel, it is vibrant and durable and can be used both inside and outside (powder coated is weather resistant). The color is a retro teal (Even though it appears almost bright blue in the bright sun photos...
    Category

    2010s Modern Abstract Sculptures

    Materials

    Steel

  • "1959 (Teal)" Metal Sculpture- steel, mid century modern, modernism, monochrome
    By Scott Troxel
    Located in Marmora, NJ
    "1959 (Teal)" is a fun modernist freestanding sculpture that brings bold statement to wherever it is placed. Made from .25" thick powder coated mild steel, it is vibrant and durable and can be used both inside and outside (powder coated is weather resistant). The color is a retro teal (Even though it appears almost bright blue in the bright sun photos...
    Category

    2010s Modern Abstract Sculptures

    Materials

    Steel

  • "Blue Palms" Metal Sculpture- steel, mid century modern, blue, cyan, monochrome
    By Scott Troxel
    Located in Marmora, NJ
    "Blue Palms" is a fun modernist freestanding sculpture that brings bold statement to wherever it is placed. Made from .25" thick powder coated mild steel, it is vibrant and durable ...
    Category

    2010s Modern Abstract Sculptures

    Materials

    Steel

  • "1959 (Orange)" Metal Sculpture- steel, mid century modern, monochrome, mcm
    By Scott Troxel
    Located in Marmora, NJ
    "1959 (Orange)" is a fun modernist freestanding sculpture that brings bold statement to wherever it is placed. Made from .125" thick powder coated mild steel, it is vibrant and dura...
    Category

    2010s Modern Abstract Sculptures

    Materials

    Steel

  • Waves and Circles, Large Outdoor/Indoor Steel Sculpture
    By Hans Van de Bovenkamp
    Located in Long Island City, NY
    Artist: Hans van de Bovenkamp, Dutch (1938 - ) Title: Circles and Waves Year: 1986 Medium: Steel Sculpture Overall Size: 87 x 50 in. (220.98 x 127 cm)
    Category

    1980s Modern Abstract Sculptures

    Materials

    Steel

Recently Viewed

View All