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Manzoni'sArtist's ShitIts not just the way poor materials have become commonplace in artbeds, tents, foodstuffs, says Frances Morris, head of collections (international art) at Tate Modern. These were all brought into the gallery by arte povera artists. But they also rejected the need to develop a personal style, approaching each work as a separate project. Thats why they tended to work across genres and media. We are used to this now but at the time it was radical.

ARTE POVERAArte Povera - "poor art" or "impoverished art" - was the most significant and influential avant-garde movement to emerge in Europe in the 1960s. It grouped the work of around a dozen Italian artists whose most distinctly recognizable trait was their use of commonplace materials that might evoke a pre-industrial age, such as earth, rocks, clothing, paper and rope.

Their work marked a reaction against the modernist abstract painting that had dominated European art in the 1950s, hence much of the group's work is sculptural. But the group also rejected AmericanMinimalism, in particular what they perceived as its enthusiasm for technology.

In this respect Arte Povera echoesPost-Minimalisttendencies in American art of the 1960s. But in its opposition tomodernismand technology, and its evocations of the past, locality and memory, the movement is distinctly Italian.Artists became slavesjust commercial trademarks, says Pistoletto about arte poveras anti-market stance. We were anti-commercial not because we were against the economy but because it felt like art was a prisoner of the economy, he adds. His Minus Objects series (1965-66) consisted of wildly disparate works that appeared to be by different artists, thereby undermining the commercial ideal that an artist should have a signature style.A return to simple objects and messagesThe body and behaviour are artThe everyday becomes meaningfulTraces of nature and industry appearDynamism and energy are embodied in the work

Nature can be documented in its physical and chemical transformationExplore the notion of space and languageComplex and symbolic signs lose meaningGround Zero, no culture, no art system, Art = Life

Burlap sacks_ Alberto Burri Arte Poveras spirit can be traced fromAlberto Burris work, whose painting made from burlap sacks, provided an example of the use of poor materials.

Concetto Spaziale _ Lucio Fontana

Structure for Talking While Standing (Minus Objects)(1965-66)Artist: Michelangelo PistolettoPistoletto's work often dealt with relationships . His earlier mirror works, which confronted self and image, explored concepts of identity. TheMinus Objectsseries was developed around the idea of art that was only completed through the addition of human interaction. In this example, we can see how the structure connects to the viewer, allowing for a place to rest the arms and feet. Dialogue was also a concern to the artist, andStructure for Standing While Talkingcreates a bridge for conversation among visitors. Pistoletto originally conceived the idea after noticing marks left on the gallery walls where people had been leaning.Venus of the ragsArtist:PistolettoPistolettos use of a sculpture of Venus in these works, as an iconic motif of the canon of Western art, invokes Italys cultural past in an ironic way. By combining the classically-inspired statue with piled-up rags the artist announces a series of oppositions: hard/soft, formed/unformed, monochrome/coloured, fixed/movable, precious/disregarded, historical/contemporary, unique/common and the cultural/the everyday. In their poorness the rags demonstrate a willingness to deploy any and all aspects of life in art

Ball of newspapers(1966)Artist: PistolettoThe globe is made from newspapers collected over a two-year period, therefore referring to the passing of time and to historical events. Pistoletto rolled this work through the streets of Turin before displaying it in the gallery setting. The moving sphere and its passage through the streets symbolises the constantly changing events and aspects of life, as reported in the newspapers that are squashed together inside it. Pistolettos concerns with material processes as well as with wider political and world issues are similar to some of the works of Boetti

Quadri specchiantiArtist: PistolettoAfter recognizing the possibilities opened up by confronting his reflection in the highly varnished surfaces of his early paintings, Pistoletto fully realized the potential of the mirror image in his celebratedQuadri specchianti(mirror paintings), initiated in 1962. The contrast between the stasis of his carefully composed figures or objects in the foreground and the circumstantial, haphazard, and frenetic mirror reflection of the present in the background generates space for both confrontation and interaction with the viewer, an instantaneous experience and an awareness of the passage of time.32 Square Meters of Sea(1967)Artist: Pino PascaliPino Pascali started out as a designer and illustrator for advertisements, and learned to push the boundaries between illusion and reality. Similar to hisCubic Meters of Earthpieces, Pascali's32 Square Meters of Seabrings together the natural and artificial. Containers hold quantities of dyed water that replicate the variegated tints of the ocean, alluding to the effects of motion and light. Yet the containers themselves also remind us of how humanity attempts to control nature. The geometric shapes and industrial materials used to produce the sculpture echo American Minimalist sculpture, though Pascali's use of a simple, natural material such as water betrays its origins in the concerns of Arte Povera. To Pascali, the poverty of the materials was essential to the artistic process: "We need the intensity of someone who has nothing, to be truly able to create something."

A Cubic Metre of Earth (1967)Artist: Pino PascaliDelighting in a wide range of materials that included steel-wool scouring pads, bread and hay, Pascali here displays the cubic square of Italian earth in all its glory, deliberately playing with ideas of abstract form and childish games with mud. He ignored the boundaries between art practices and everyday life, and aimed to transform the notion of play into high art. Discuss what Pascali might be saying about the nature of Italian soil. Do you think he is being serious or funny? Think about earth as a material for making art. What other, more traditional, types of art are made from materials that are found in the ground?.

Floor Tautology(1967)Artist: Luciano FabroBy the time he joined the Arte Povera group, Luciano Fabro was already a well-known artist associated with the likes of Piero Manzoni and Lucio Fontana, two important precursors of the movement. HisFloor Tautologyinvolves an area of floor, kept polished and covered with newspapers to dry. Shown in Germano Celant's first survey of Arte Povera, Fabro's celebration of an ordinary task was instrumental in his attempt to recalibrate the concept of fine art. The elevation of a duty associated with housework - and most often coded as women's work - became a theme in his later pieces that utilized bed sheets and other fabrics.

Foot(1967)Artist: Luciano FabroThis work is one of a group of giant piedi (feet) made using marble, metal, glass and silk. Fabro later produced yet more, using an even wider variety of materials. He juxtaposes these huge feet with a sensual pillar of silk, stretching up to the ceiling. This negates any idea that Arte Povera was only about poor materials. Craftsmanship, as well as rich materials, is celebrated in a monumental but also humorous way. We can enjoy the pleasure and skill in the handling of the materials and the wonderful scale of these enormous timeless feet. In this work Fabro shows his concern with the contrast between the manmade and nature by bringing together both organic and inorganic materials.

StackArtist: Tony CraggStack resembles a cross section view of long forgotten, buried rubbish. He identifies as key themes in his work his relationships to the natural world and the human kinds impact on nature. It is natural world versus manmade world. He refuses to distinguish between the landscape and the city adding that manmade objects are fossilised keys to a past time which is our present. he seeks to build a poetic mythology for the industrially produced objects of our time.