Fourteen, the Frog

Silkscreen depicting the archetype of the apple.

The Nature series stems from the quest to transform an image into a symbol through a planned reduction that tends to eliminate the superfluous in favor of meaning, with a view to creating art multiples. From 1961 to 1976, Mari designed 17 symbols produced with silkscreens on Texiline. Mari began working on the subjects that constitute this series as early as 1957: in that year, he conceived the first version of the Gioco Delle Favole, which Danese would put into production in 1965. Having become almost a symbol of Danese's production, this series is among the few examples of editions that achieve the goal of creating 'artistic' images for the home, grounded in the concept of seriality. No originals of these works exist, as the final image is achieved only through the technical processes of reproduction (silkscreen). Through the choice of these 'archetypal' subjects, the form and technique of their representation, Mari seems to seek a sort of 'super-icon'.