ROBERTO FONTANELLA
Solve et Coagula
12th – 28th February 2021
Opening 16th January 2021 at 18:00 hrs
The Exhibition
The union of the natural and earthly world with the conceptual and dreamlike one, in the works of Roberto Fontanella becomes a stimulus for an intimate search of the individual towards inner illumination, which leads to change the way of living external reality in symbiosis with the deeper spirit of being. Conceptual and material aspect of life are the emblem of the coexistence of multiple dualities, finding balance in alchemy, a practice of remote origin that linked science and metaphysics for a deeper reading of existence. Today alchemy takes on an extremely important value that opposes the concealment of inner truth, inviting each of us to perceive the surrounding reality without ever separating from our own spiritual essence.
Solve et Coagula is an action that applies alchemy in today's reality, proving that the surrounding world provides us with everything we need, but to fully grasp it, a scientific analysis approach combined with the art of coagulating everything is required. in one great stream of life. This is why the artist's journey stimulates an introspective research by creating analogies and bonds of antagonistic forces represented through color, almost entirely reduced to black and white, and the words written directly on the works.
The Works
The Artist
Roberto Fontanella was born in Chiampo, in the province of Vicenza, in 1958, where he now lives and works. After an experience in the field of technical drawing, he develops his creative talent by dedicating himself to the study of art history and the consolidation of artistic techniques.
He thus frequented the Venetian environment of the Bevilacqua La Masa Foundation, where he exhibited for the first time at the annual collective exhibition in 1991, creating the opportunity for an important parallel with the public.
Also in Venice, in 1993 he founded the Triplani group together with the artists Franco Cimitan, Guerrino Pain, Tobia Ravà, Cesare Vignato and the theorist Umberto Daniele, exchanging experiences and provoking contaminations throughout the decade. After a period of detachment, the group of artists met again in 2009 and 2016.
Fontanella uses a technique that ranges from traditional oil painting to the continuous experimentation of material combinations aggregated in different mixtures capable of originating, individually, specific types of surfaces on which to work.
This sculptural trend is explicit in the reuse of pre-industrial components within three-dimensional structures of small and large dimensions and in environmental installations, frequently obtained by combining unconventional materials.
The focus of his personal research is based on philosophical and metaphysical concepts of both Eastern and Western matrix, in a path that tends more and more to the truth of the origins and the authenticity of the requests. The artist investigates the vital link between the external world of nature and infinitesimal atoms, that of the inner personal microcosm, creative and imaginative, and the upper one of the boundless macrocosm, which goes beyond the limits of those who live and breathe on this Earth.
His works tell of the symbols that accompany the alchemical path of Opus Magnum towards the creation of the legendary philosopher's stone, the tool for achieving the golden transformation that is spiritual evolution.
Umberto Daniele, Enrico Gusella, Valeria Modica, Alice Traforti, Maria Luisa Trevisan wrote about him.
The Shots
With the patronage of