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Italian artist Pier Paolo Calzolari (born 1943 in Bologna) is a major exponent of Arte Povera, known for the formal originality of his multi-faceted practice (painting and sculpture, but also performances he looks on as "acts of passion"), which has often made use of such organic materials as tobacco leaves, fire and frost to create "work-installations" that challenge the limits of contemporary art.
His grandfather introduced him to traditional painting techniques when he was still a child. He later studied at the academies of fine arts in Bologna and Rome but did not complete his courses. He began his artistic career as a painter influenced by American "germinal" painting, before quickly turning to other, freer forms of artistic expression, such as installation, sculpture and performance art.
His production first came to notice in Italy in 1967 with his performance installation Il Filtro e Benvenuto all'Angelo (The Filter and Welcome to the Angel), which he created in his Studio Bentivoglio in Bologna. He rapidly became associated with Arte Povera, an Italian art movement of the 1960s and '70s distinguished by its use of humble materials and its emphasis on the dimensions of ephemerality and process in art. He became internationally known with exhibitions in New York and Paris mounted by the Galerie Sonnabend. In 1972, he broke the boundaries of a period of art that he considered already finished when he produced a reflection on painting with his composite work Lasciare il posto, which combined monochrome painting, frosted sculpture, elements of still life, and performance art embodied by Calzolari's physical and sonic presence.
Regularly exhibited around the world, Pier Paolo Calzolari's works are held in leading private collections, foundations and museums, such as the Centre Pompidou in Paris and the Guggenheim Museum in New York. Today he is considered one of the most important and innovative artists of the post-war period.