Enrico Donati- Weinstein Gallery, de Young Museum San Francisco

Enrico Donati is considered one of the original surrealist artists- A group which included among others Salvador Dali, Andre Breton, Max Ernst, Marcel Duchamp and Alexander Calder.  Mr. Donati died about two years ago at the age of 99 after a cab accident from which he never fully recovered.  During his career he reinvented his artistic genres to include Constructivism and Abstract Expressionism. 

Showing now at the Weinstein Gallery in San Fransisco’s Union square is an exhibition of works from his later years.  His focus seemed to have shifted to an examination of geometric shapes and layering and texture.  He often mixed paint with glue and a variety of grains such as dust, dirt, soot, sand, coffee grounds and was even known to use the contents of this vacuum cleaner. 

The works at the Weinstein Gallery are exceptional in that they were the works that he chose to keep in his personal collection until the end of his life. In many ways this exhibition is not just the grand epithet of Donati but of Surrealism.  Donati is the last surviving member of one of the most remarkable art movements of the twentieth century.

There are a few of Mr. Donati’s works at the de Young Gallery which is located in Golden Gate Park in SF.  These last two are on show there.