the Italian job
an excerpt from the upcoming exhibition of grand masters of the lower rennaysonce

Giottitti Gulpanarmadillo (1542-1756)

"Plague, rats, disease, death, lice and waterslides" is how the 16th century tourist bureau describes Giottitti Gulpanarmadillo's home town of Verinniccia, nestled as it does between the rolling yellow hills of the Apia Distended and the steaming bogs of the Gristly Marsh. By all accounts his parents, lower middle class peasants whose dreams of the idleness of nobility and a love of tropical fruit propelled Giottitti into a career as an artist for the court of Prince Slatt Van Fiat.

"The Prince demands obsequious my darling Hilda, a high degree of toadying and when roused to passion a good strong cup of steaming pineapple juice. He bade us make artworks from morn till the next morn while his guests did frolic and pleasure themselves in his aromatic gardens of pomegranates and cicada trees. How many debaucheries against the very nature of god and the very fermerments I did witness and can attest as our lord and saviour as my witness that ...my precious Hilda, I cannot go on, my foot is caught in the soot cauldron again, but I have sent sketches of the very things I bespoken of and a list, sortd alphabetically of the affronts to the virgin Mary. Having a lovely time, weather is great."

Writes Gulpanarmadillo in a postcard to a woman many assumed to be his wife, although details of the great artists life are at best sketchy, based as they are upon his seven volume autobiography and a series of pornographic postcards he posted in his first eight years under the tutelage of the great master painter and manicurist Franko Szondy (1503-1682?).

Giottitti Gulpanarmadillo's greatest works, The Blessed Virgin Embraces the Holy Pineapple (fig. 1) and his masterwork, Our Lord Tempted by The Angry Phoenician in Semaphore (fig 2), are monumental works of piety and tropical fruit. His flowing brush strokes pre-empt the rise of the neo-classical post rapheletic in and out of the high reniaisconce, while his subject matter touches upon the similar themes as Heronimouse Bosch, the decay and imminent death of salvation unless saved by the piety of the masses, while his use of tropical fruit as a motif predates Smorgies all you can eat platters by some 500 years.

The blessed virgin (fig 1) is abandoned in rapture, her pineapple a metaphor for life itself and the scattering of green leaves an obvious incantation of the then Pope Pious the Not II's famed speech on wether Jesus would have used salad dressing or wether he would have just used a little vinegar and oil, or maybe some of the mhyrr he had by the bucket load. The answer an eternal conundrum for those in the church, and one not answered by Giottitti, merely hinted at as he searched for the divine within the frozen form of wilted lettuce he so despised.

"Agnes, what debauchers, what philanderers, what arch deacons of satans boils made a flower which when left for five minutes while I privy, melts to the elemental essence of primordial water. Wether fairly bad, rained a lot yesterday and I stubbed my toe on Tintoretto. Hope all is well with the family."

He writes in 1648, darker days were still ahead for the great painter, but greater days were ahead for painting itself.

Giottitti presented his master work, Our Lord Tempted by The Angry Phoenician in Semaphore (fig 2) to the Pope at the Feast of St Sibeilius in Rome. For many minutes the Pontiff sat stunned, drool fell from his chin and a loud expelling of gas was heard. Here was truly a masterwork, all agreed, vehemently disagreed, fighting ensued and a roasted hog thrown in Giottitti's direction. Controversy has never been a great selling point, the allegorical illusions were there for all to see. The Phoenician captain conversing in semaphore was interpreted to mean the pope had very little idea about what was going on even when a blinding light permeated his eyeballs, harking back as it does to the old testament story of Jonah and the giant peach, crudely alive and brimming with vehement hatred of the illusions and delusory nature of earthly power. The virgin Mary, seen here naked and wantonly removing her draws became the template for many years to come in the painterly world. Here was not a god, but a woman, in flesh and blood, just dying to get it on with any well hung deity. Shocking, yet in the lower portions of the high renaisonce, much debate ensued over what position the lord used to impregnate the blessed virgin and wether she perhaps led him on a bit.

The image of Jesus, supine and prowling the canvas like a motorised grizzly bear, commands respect and is an obvious authority figure worthy of two pineapples, a kings ransom in those days. One hand rests on or near his heart, strongly suggesting heartburn or maybe a peptic ulcer from the over consumption of such rich fruits. If the kingdom of heaven were truly paradise, pineapples and maybe guavas or mangos would be in such abundance that one could afford to eat them like the Italian staple, vermotti. Yet Giottitti tempers this joyful embrace of the lords bounty and wisdom with the flying turnip of Satan, aimed provocatively at Christ heart, like an antacid from the serpent of hell.

This was to herald in the dark period of Giottitti's life, when all traces of the tropical fruits disappear and are replaced with turnips, potatoes and small grilled peppers. Each more realistic, each more morbidly brushed into the canvas, until in his final years, he could barely even get the paint onto the canvas such were his sufferings. But then, most have seen this as a reaction to the suffering of the ordinary peasants, whilst the princes of the church gorged themselves on papaia and mangosteens with a strawberry coulis. For many Giottitti broke the mold and invented cubic photorealism, for others he didn't even get close.

"Beryl, I see despair, decay stalking the streets. Plague has struck Padua (his then residence), the dying are tossed into my backyard, and children scour the gutters in a desperate search for any morsel, their wafer thin bones are barely held within their wafer thin skins. Meanwhile, prince M, greest his guests with sacks of golden pineapples and mockels the lord with fatted hogs heads roasted in quince jelly and served on a bed of most lascivious juices. Looks like the rain will clear by Friday, Matteo says to say hello, he went to a bordello on Tuesday, but came away unsatisfied, love to all at the local tavern. Can you send a shovel."

Today we see in all its restored glory, these two works for the first time in many years, we hope you enjoy the Italian job exhibition of grand masters of the lower rennaysonce