Francesco Clemente Reflects on Four Decades of Painting and Transformation

Francesco Clemente often seems to have been with the right people at the right time. Aged just 22, he traveled to Afghanistan with Arte Povera master Alighiero Boetti. In 1980s-era New York, he hung out with Jean-Michel Basquiat and Keith Haring, and decorated the walls of the Palladium nightclub for Steve Rubell. He created a series of paintings for a 1998 adaptation of Great Expectations by Alfonso Cuaron—recast to a swampy Florida—as the work of its protagonist Finn Bell (Ethan Hawke). Salman Rushdie wrote the catalogue essay for a show of his portraits at Gagosian in 2005. In 2024, he had a lively encounter with Ed Ruscha in Interview magazine. Peter Marino is a fan.