Double Draftsman

Manhattan gallery-hoppers found a refreshing change last week from the usual abstract-expressionist slatherings. Rome's Domenico Gnoli, an Old World newcomer of 26. exhibited a sheaf of big, clear-cut, conservative drawings at the Bianchini Gallery, found himself famed and in the money. What attracted critics and buyers alike was Gnoli's obvious mastery, modesty and calm. Though not the greatest virtues possible to art, these qualities are currently rare--and as delightful as cold water after a binge.

Gnoli was strictly raised for his profession by his father, an art expert and critic. At twelve, the boy was required not only to identify art styles at a glance, but also to imitate them precisely on paper. "Father smoked so much at my drawing sessions," he recalls, "that by the end of the day I couldn't see him across the studio. He was like Zeus on a dais; you had to cut through clouds to get to him."

At 18, Gnoli broke his pencils and joined an Italian road company as a "no-talent" actor. Spear carrying eventually led to a promising career in theater design. But art drew him back to Rome, where he conceived the best pictures in last week's show--austere descriptions in ink of the city's dark and quiet corners: a hand laundry where only the linen sparkles, an empty tavern where the chairs seem to converse.

Gnoli's strength is double-edged: he knows how to represent what he sees sharply and solidly; also he knows how to design. Light and darkness, tension and repose, surface textures and deep space all interplay with the stories his pictures tell.

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