Composizione, 1957

Bottiglia e barattolo (Bottle and Jar), 1954, is the only truly figurative work in the group acquired by the CRT Foundation for the purposes of fully conveying the history of Italian painting from the 1950s, along with paintings already in the GAM collections. It would be some years before another still life entered the collection, with the acquisition of a 1943 work by Renato Guttuso, an artist whose point of view was driven by realism, a direction completely opposite from that of Art Informel during that same period.

The peculiarity of the inclusion of Bottiglia e barattolo in the collection already says something about Romiti’s distinct relationship to experiences he nonetheless shared in terms of other pictorial directions, exhibition occasions, and the attention of critics such as Francesco Arcangeli, who wrote about his early shows. [...]