I fought with a Maestro and won his respect
The Istituto Nazionale per il Dramma Antico (INDA), is the most important institution for ancient drama in Italy, and each year they present a series of Greek tragedies. As is custom with INDA, a famous artist is always asked to draw the featured picture, and in 1986, Giuseppe Mazzullo was it. Mazzullo, a very well known Italian sculptor in his late seventies, had friends like Picasso, and Emilio Greco, and was known for his hot-temper.
I had been asked to design and coordinate the advertising poster with Mazzullo.
When I presented the first layout to him, he quickly replied, “My art will never be reduced to some stupid manifesto for mechanics and washerwomen.”
I responded, “Master with all due respect, the moment you accepted this job, you accepted to work also for mechanics and washerwomen. They more than all the community of artists and friends need to see these dramas. These are the people we want to get in contact with, these are the people we want to fill our theaters with.” Needless to say, the temperature in the room rose 20 degrees and our mutual friends trembled on the sidelines fearing Mazzullo’s violent response.
The fight began and continued through several rejected layouts, until he agreed to one. He had described his drawing as, “…a mother crying because she lost a child.” I kept that in mind, placing her on a dark background at the bottom of my artwork, – away from its original cloud level space – and surrounded with type I designed especially for this project. I’ll never forget the moment when he accepted it.
We were in his home filled with huge canvases and sculptures by his friends, Picasso, Guttuso and Fiume among others. Seeing this, I was feeling a bit foolish for crossing the master.
But as a token of his appreciation he gave me one of his drawings, which he later signed, “To Gonzales, bravo, bravo, Mazzullo.” He specified afterwards that he never used exclamation marks, and the second bravo was intended instead of it. The poster still hangs on my wall at home to remind me that some battles push us where we need to go.
