Exhibitions, Italy, Milano, 07 October 2010
THE LIGHT CORE OF THE WORLD.
by Lorenzo Canova.
What mystery lays in a matter at its core dense and porous, where in its
rudeness and in its heaviness matter transforms itself in a substance bright
and light? In that thin air and transparency lays the paradox of its origins,
which is based on a body made out of soil and smashed rocks.
Manovella has been working on this mystery, which represents one of its
pivotal point of his poetics, for a long time. According to the painter the
nature of matter, rude and mineral, wishes to free itself from the burden
that bounds it to the soil so to reach an aeriform condition where gravity
ceases to be and a new stage of sublimation is achieved.
Manovella has well understood that painting represents one of the strongest creative means in shaping this oxymoron, where a dull and heavy
world undergoes a fantastical metamorphosis through the active reconstruction of the artist. In Manovella’s view, indeed, levity and suspension becomes features of every single element. Each one of these elements brighten themselves up with a special light, which is more shed than received, that fills and measures distances transforming them into a new dimension, plausible and at the same time unreal. This is where the presence of human beings acquires a particular feature, which stands in the middle between the deep and profound dynamics that characterize a dream and the necessity to assert the physical weight of certain work. Indeed, as a result these works are at the same time static, within their metaphoric assertion, and dynamic, within their narrative structure.
By using extra-pictorial elements, they are used, for instance, to compose bodies made out of texture or to create dresses for the figures portrayed that wear fit and in a quite tangible way, the sense of tactile, typical of his paintings, is furthermore stressed. Manovella chooses to use the language of life and of the real to represent visions of an imaginary world, so to assemble a parallel universe characterized by the mechanics, which at a first sight they can be perceived as unlikely. However, after a closer look these mechanics are, after all, based on a strict made up rule system. It is within this realm where the painter bases the absurd and, at the same time, plausible coordinates of the spatial construction of his paintings.
Every single detail in Manovella’s work, is accurately and cleverly composed, however, these same particulars may be at times painted almost carelessly, at a first look, and at other times these details are painted in such a rigorous manner to be so close to the “real”. Manovella gives form to his personal reality where things and people free themselves from the burden of everyday life within a story, so told by the artist, where incredible and fabulous events take place. In this world objects come to life and animals can speak to men or to rainbows popping out from a box capable of containing the sky and the planets within its microscopic walls. Within the purity of a milky substance, everything moves in a sidereal harmony of an unknown firmament. The sun and the moon end up being like two toys, which they can recall two balloons that the artist often uses to allusively underline his constant aspiration towards the above. Heads and legs detach themselves from their bodies to assume a life of their own and a new presence within the composition of his paintings.
In these works, indeed, everything mysteriously looses its weight thanks to the refined grace with which Manovella is able to portray even bodies that are, by nature, rude and stocky. Like the ones of a boxer, which in these paintings are able to mildly take flight like a kite, while other bodies eloquently are perceived as heavier and this is the case of the enormous humming-bird, which rests on a man’s head, used almost as if that were a pack horse. Art builds these alterations where an hybrid and mutant nature, in which plants, animals and human beings merge together and in which the archetypes of myths and fables seem to be regenerated through the mechanisms of an enigmatic metamorphosis. This is a process that is born from a vivid creative freedom and from a visionary artist that is constantly renewed within a realm characterized by constant change and regeneration.
Manovella is able to compose elegies that portray in a gentle symphony a dreamed and unreachable world, where spaces are initially hinted and then denied, all within an indoor dimension with no perspective that all of a sudden becomes a forest, a mountain or a starry sky. In these elegies, therefore, naked women lay down on flowers as if they were fairies of a ‘midsummer’ and pianos transforms themselves into birds to sweeten their chant. Within fairy-tale territories placed beyond the mirror, there is a lighten world where the heavy soil becomes light and where, thanks to art, men wear fairy wings that allow them to overcome their limits. This opens a bright waylay in the thick and dull blanket of appearances so to find again, at last, the perfume and the meaning of the light core of the world.
by Lorenzo Canova.
What mystery lays in a matter at its core dense and porous, where in its
rudeness and in its heaviness matter transforms itself in a substance bright
and light? In that thin air and transparency lays the paradox of its origins,
which is based on a body made out of soil and smashed rocks.
Manovella has been working on this mystery, which represents one of its
pivotal point of his poetics, for a long time. According to the painter the
nature of matter, rude and mineral, wishes to free itself from the burden
that bounds it to the soil so to reach an aeriform condition where gravity
ceases to be and a new stage of sublimation is achieved.
Manovella has well understood that painting represents one of the strongest creative means in shaping this oxymoron, where a dull and heavy
world undergoes a fantastical metamorphosis through the active reconstruction of the artist. In Manovella’s view, indeed, levity and suspension becomes features of every single element. Each one of these elements brighten themselves up with a special light, which is more shed than received, that fills and measures distances transforming them into a new dimension, plausible and at the same time unreal. This is where the presence of human beings acquires a particular feature, which stands in the middle between the deep and profound dynamics that characterize a dream and the necessity to assert the physical weight of certain work. Indeed, as a result these works are at the same time static, within their metaphoric assertion, and dynamic, within their narrative structure.
By using extra-pictorial elements, they are used, for instance, to compose bodies made out of texture or to create dresses for the figures portrayed that wear fit and in a quite tangible way, the sense of tactile, typical of his paintings, is furthermore stressed. Manovella chooses to use the language of life and of the real to represent visions of an imaginary world, so to assemble a parallel universe characterized by the mechanics, which at a first sight they can be perceived as unlikely. However, after a closer look these mechanics are, after all, based on a strict made up rule system. It is within this realm where the painter bases the absurd and, at the same time, plausible coordinates of the spatial construction of his paintings.
Every single detail in Manovella’s work, is accurately and cleverly composed, however, these same particulars may be at times painted almost carelessly, at a first look, and at other times these details are painted in such a rigorous manner to be so close to the “real”. Manovella gives form to his personal reality where things and people free themselves from the burden of everyday life within a story, so told by the artist, where incredible and fabulous events take place. In this world objects come to life and animals can speak to men or to rainbows popping out from a box capable of containing the sky and the planets within its microscopic walls. Within the purity of a milky substance, everything moves in a sidereal harmony of an unknown firmament. The sun and the moon end up being like two toys, which they can recall two balloons that the artist often uses to allusively underline his constant aspiration towards the above. Heads and legs detach themselves from their bodies to assume a life of their own and a new presence within the composition of his paintings.
In these works, indeed, everything mysteriously looses its weight thanks to the refined grace with which Manovella is able to portray even bodies that are, by nature, rude and stocky. Like the ones of a boxer, which in these paintings are able to mildly take flight like a kite, while other bodies eloquently are perceived as heavier and this is the case of the enormous humming-bird, which rests on a man’s head, used almost as if that were a pack horse. Art builds these alterations where an hybrid and mutant nature, in which plants, animals and human beings merge together and in which the archetypes of myths and fables seem to be regenerated through the mechanisms of an enigmatic metamorphosis. This is a process that is born from a vivid creative freedom and from a visionary artist that is constantly renewed within a realm characterized by constant change and regeneration.
Manovella is able to compose elegies that portray in a gentle symphony a dreamed and unreachable world, where spaces are initially hinted and then denied, all within an indoor dimension with no perspective that all of a sudden becomes a forest, a mountain or a starry sky. In these elegies, therefore, naked women lay down on flowers as if they were fairies of a ‘midsummer’ and pianos transforms themselves into birds to sweeten their chant. Within fairy-tale territories placed beyond the mirror, there is a lighten world where the heavy soil becomes light and where, thanks to art, men wear fairy wings that allow them to overcome their limits. This opens a bright waylay in the thick and dull blanket of appearances so to find again, at last, the perfume and the meaning of the light core of the world.
Comments 0
Say something