“My work is simple: the subject matter is stripped to the basics and what remains is an icon withan aura of philosophical suspension, and a window into the enigma of existence. The drawings onwhich the paintings are build are precise and have the same aim as those made by caveman ,which was to give a shape to their desires, their dreams.
Italian art from the Middle Ages showed me how painting can communicate across barriers of low literacy, and it is with this concept in mind that I make art, delivering a message simple and unambiguous.
Tuscan early Renaissance painting, Giotto and Fra Beato Angelico in particular, had great influence in my upbringing as an artist, specifically for the composition and narrative technique.My aim is to I create a neutral atmosphere, away from any kind of engagement. The purpose of doing so is to elevate the fictional characters I paint into a place outside of the real world: it’s a redacted version of reality where the weight of existence is edited out.
The characters I paint come in the form of essential shapes that relate to the geometric spacescreated in the canvas more than to any pretense of realism or anatomical accuracy. The paintingscene is organized in a “matter of fact” fashion, self sufficient and self explanatory, similar to anadvertisement.
The subjects are inspired by real life in a very loose way; some are from my life experience, someare made up or inspired by things I read or movies or art I see. I am open to all kind of visualinfluence.
What inspires me are people , their aura, how they inhabit the space around them, how they relateto one another visually. Art of the past also inspires me: there’s always much to explore in a painted figure, it tells us a lot about ourselves and the time we live in , it’s the mirrored image of one’s self.
My work routine consists of drawing a lot. I don’t draw from live subjects but from memory, this way I highlight something peculiar of the subject or the situation, after which I rearrange the composition on canvas. My paintings are in the middle ground between calculated and instinctive and it’s the workflow that makes every choice spontaneous.”
