We Love Make-Believe: Giorgio de Chirico and the “Theatrical Aspect” of Metaphysical Art- Rakastamme mielikuvitusleikkejä: Giorgio de Chirico ja metafyysisen taiteen ”teatterimaiset piirteet

In this essay, Lorenzo Canova investigates the intrinsic theatricality of Giorgio de Chirico’s Metaphysical art, analyzing its conceptual and visual structures in light of the artist’s philosophical writings and scenographic practice. Canova argues that the “theatrical aspect” in de Chirico’s painting—manifested through motifs such as curtains, mannequins, and architectural stage-like compositions—constitutes a fundamental strategy for staging metaphysical revelation and epistemological uncertainty. Drawing upon sources including Schopenhauer, Heraclitus, and de Chirico’s own literary and theoretical texts, the essay demonstrates how the image of the opening curtain functions as both a metaphor for unveiling hidden truths and a formal device that disrupts conventional spatial logic. Canova further contextualizes de Chirico’s engagement with the theatre, particularly his work as a set and costume designer for opera and ballet, as a crucial extension of his pictorial metaphysics. The study concludes by examining the persistence of these theatrical strategies in the artist’s later Neo-Metaphysical period, where self-referentiality and baroque theatricality serve to reaffirm the fictive, imaginative essence of painting as a site of metaphysical inquiry.