22MUSE Antwerp presents Giacomo Piussi

22MUSE cordially invites you to ‘People I Know’ a solo exhibition featuring oil paintings on canvas by Giacomo Piussi.

"It is an ideal world that recalls common gestures a step away from the flow of time and in the same moment part of contemporary life".

About the artist:

Giacomo Piussi was born in 1967 in Udine and lives and works in Florence. His work develops the idea of substituting the written word with images that is typical of much of the art of non-literate societies of the past. The images are those of a world reduced to its essence. Where every element has a function and very little is added to what is needed for the core meaning to be delivered with a style that is inspired by early renaissance art in its clarity of intent: rather than imitating nature appearance there is a reach for the philosophical structure underlying life and relations.

The environment and the characters that live within it are the quintessence of ease peace and self-containment. The figures are gods in their daily Olympus. It is an ideal world that recalls common gestures a step away from the flow of time and in the same moment part of contemporary life. The drama or the lack of thereof is played out in simplified almost abstract spaces geometric backgrounds in which self-aware characters inhabit bourgeois interiors or a minimalist wilderness.

The artist about his work:

“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 on which 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 spaces created in the canvas more than to any pretense of realism or anatomical accuracy. The painting scene is organized in a “matter of fact” fashion self sufficient and self explanatory similar to an advertisement.

The subjects are inspired by real life in a very loose way; some are from my life experience some are made up or inspired by things I read or movies or art I see. I am open to all kind of visual influence.

What inspires me are people their aura how they inhabit the space around them how they relate to 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.”

‘Piussi opens a hidden door he leads our gaze to a world that swallows us based on a contemporary reality while also showing us an alluring alternative that suddenly absorb us and makes us a part of its conversations of its crystal clear daily life. And so it happens almost by magic to turn the eye and recognise the images around us to see through their eyes and this is no dream but a possibility a solution o the our most ordinary days.’ - Lorenzo Nannelli