Frith Street Gallery is delighted to announce an exhibition of works by Giuseppe Penone. One of the most celebrated artists of his generation, Penone is perhaps the leading member of the Arte Povera movement which started in Italy in the late 1960s. Penone's practice examines the materiality of the world through sculpture, continuously reflecting the similarities between nature and human beings - revealing the secret universe of hidden images within seemingly inert materials.

Scultura di linfa, 2006 relates directly to the artist's distinctive Albero series of sculptures. In these works wooden beams were pared down until the form of the tree from which they were cut emerged. In the present sculpture the tree contained in the beam is excavated from the wood leaving behind its negative impression which is filled with highly scented tree resin.

The process of creation by subtraction of matter is also present in two marble sculptures Pelle di marmo 2001 and Pelle di marmo su spine d'acacia - Lucrezia 2003. Here the artist uses the veins within blocks of Carrara marble revealing the deep natural and cultural affinities between flesh and stone, the veins of the body and those of material - sculpture ancient and contemporary. The idea of encasement is explored further in Lo spazio della scultura, corteccia, 2004. In this work a bronze cast of the bark of a 200 year old cedar is partly covered by leather which has been beaten into the contours of the surface, the materials both conceal and mimic the tree's natural structure.

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Giuseppe Penone was born in Garessio, Italy in 1947. He had a major retrospective exhibition at the Centre Pompidou, Paris in 2004. Other recent solo exhibitions include: Academie de France a Rome-Villa Medici, Rome (2008), La Biennale di Venezia, Italian Pavillion, Venice (2007) and Museum Kurhaus Kleve, Kleve, Germany (2006). Recent group exhibitions include: Sydney Biennale, Sydney, Australia (2008), "Arte Povera" at Kunstmuseum, Liechtenstein (2007) and "Zero to Infinity: Arte Povera 1962-1972" at Tate Modern, London (2001) and the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis.

For further information please contact Dale McFarland  +44 207 494 1550