Salvatore Emblema /
May 28 – Jul 5, 2025 /
Opening: Tuesday, May 27, 6pm – 8pm /
White Cube Hong Kong
50 Connaught Road, Central
Hong Kong
+852 2592 2000
Tuesday – Saturday, 11am – 7pm
White Cube Hong Kong is pleased to present a solo exhibition of paintings and sculpture by Italian artist Salvatore Emblema (1929–2006). Marking the first ever presentation of the artist’s works in Asia, the exhibition follows a solo show at White Cube Paris in 2024.
Spanning a 30-year period of works made between the 1960s and 1990s, the Hong Kong exhibition includes Emblema’s signature paintings made with raw pigments on jute canvas, as well as Untitled / Ricerca sul paesaggio (1972), a suspended sculpture comprising a metal net hung across the gallery’s walls.
Born in 1929 in Terzigno, Naples, Emblema’s practice, with its singular focus on the qualities of light, space and transparency, diverged from that of his contemporaries in Italy’s post-war avant-garde. Inspired by the landscape of his upbringing – a volcanic red zone on the slopes of Mount Vesuvius – Emblema worked predominantly with natural materials, utilising soils, stones and other agricultural substances to extract his pigments.
His artistic approach was further shaped by encounters with Jean Dubuffet’s earth and gravel compositions in the early 1950s, as well as his first visit to New York in 1957. It was here that Emblema became acquainted with the Abstract Expressionist movement, drawing particular inspiration from the colour-field paintings of Mark Rothko.
Click here for more information on the artist and the exhibition.
