|
|
Mario Loprete ,Catanzaro (ITALY) 1968 Graduate at Accademia of Belle Arti , Catanzaro (ITALY) Painting for me is the first love. An important, pure love. Creating a painting, starting from the spasmodic research of a concept with which I want to send a message to transmit my message, it’s the base of my painting. The sculpture is my lover, my artistic betrayal to the painting. That voluptuous and sensual lover that gives me different emotions, that touches prohibited cords For my Concrete Sculptures I use my personal clothing. Throughout some artistic process, in which I use plaster, resin and cement, I transform them in artworks to hang. My memory, my DNA, my memories remain concreted inside, transforming the person that looks at the artworks a type of post-modern archaeologist that studies my work as they were urban artifacts. At what point in your life did you know that you wanted to become an artist? Did the realization emerge slowly? I live in Catanzaro at 9 hours from New York, exactly the duration of the flight from the nearest airport Lamezia Terme, will take me to the Big Apple, the Eldorado for those who, like me, do art seriously and professionally. I am an outgoing, talkative and very positive person. I always set goals a bit 'more important than those who preceded them, because I believe that immediately realizing the big dreams in life, you risk losing that desire and that longing that makes you feel alive. As a child I started to draw before I could speak because my vocabulary was focused on images. At school, at home, everywhere, I always drew. This served to speed up my hand and stroke. The design for me has never been just the means to reproduce from a picture or from the truth, it has always been a continuous search for the form of things, their essence, their soul. In all my daily activities, I look at the things that surround me, mentally tracing the contours and looking for escape points from where everything starts or where everything comes. How did you evolve your style and favorite mediums? Artistically I formed myself as a self-taught person, studying the history of art and the great Masters in an aseptic way, without external contamination. I went to a shop for six years by a master from Catanzaro, from whom I learned a lot. Until 2002 I was traveling around Calabria to paint from life, with the main purpose of speeding up the hand and acquiring technique, fighting against the time that changed lights and colors. Then I realized I was missing something inside, I felt a feeling of emptiness. Then at 34 I decided to enroll in the Academy of Fine Arts in Catanzaro, aware that to give more depth to my work I needed to compare myself with other artists, exchange experiences and seek new stimuli. In February 2007 I finished my studies and I came out enriched and very motivated. The desire to do is very great. I get up in the morning and I want to paint. I go to bed late at night and feel empty and I think another day spent searching for the Force in my work, because I have never tried to be and become a fashion painter of the moment. What are your time management techniques? Do you have regular working hours...or favorite times to work? The realization of my works is classical. After having drawn the very detailed drawing, I pass to the oil color and veils after veiling arrive at the final result. When the finished painting is perfectly dry, I pass on a particular paint that can not only link all the colors and shades, but gives the work the brilliance and lucidity of the Poster, that each of us has had attached to the wall of the his bedroom. Do you work on more than one piece at a time, or primarily just on one? I work at the same time on different jobs creating a complete series of the project that I'm doing. What would you say is your biggest influence--that which keeps you working, regardless of all else, your most steadfast motivation? I am terribly and morbidly attracted to people, I portray them with the utmost emotional intensity. The human figure is fascinating to portray, a real challenge. I am looking for the right people, the very expressive ones, who are in my humble opinion, the incarnation and the materialization of the Soul. My research leads me to document the stereotypes that crowd the music genre, of which I "feed" while I paint. The subjects of my paintings take shape from photos that I take personally or download from the internet, I process them to the computer and delete what 'for me is superfluo. I have a database of 5000 photos divided by artist, photo cut, social theme, projects for future exhibitions, etc. I really like to portray Ja rule, Xzibit, The Game, Mary J Blige, Beyonce and 50 cents and all the rappers of the Italian hip hop scene, much closer to me. Many Italian rappers know my work and ask me to make a portrait of them. This thing is a source of pride and pride for me and my work. I have participated in many exhibitions, in many competitions, but I am convinced that the winning of a prize, or ten prizes, does not change your life if you do not have the work force behind, that force that will sustain you when the descending parable will inevitably start . Certainly in my life I will not write pages of art history, I will not participate in the Venice Biennale, I will not exhibit my works at MOMA in New York, but I am sure I will have given my painting, my painting, narcissistically speaking . Does trying something new and not knowing the rules -- the boundary pushing -- create anxiety or excitement in you? (Or both?) “I live in a world that I shape at my liking, throughout a virtual pictorial and sculptural movement, transferring my experiences, photographing reality throughout my filters, refined from years research and experimentation. Painting for my is the first love. An important, pure love. Creating a painting, starting from the spasmodic research of a concept with which I want to send a message to transmit my message, it’s the base of my painting. The sculpture is my lover, my artistic betrayal to the painting. That voluptuous and sensual lover that gives me different emotions, that touches prohibited cords… Do you enjoy having the "duality of both chaos and control" or are you happiest with a set plan? My studio is my happy island where chaos reigns. sometimes I buy things I don't know I have. I like to be able to think that one day I will make the order reign, but until that day I try to enjoy my healthy and unnerving chaos. Do you have any projects or events forthcoming? For the next year I am preparing a series of personal exhibitions in which the common denominator is the world and the metropolitan culture. Alterno the use of the classic canvas as a support for a new one that intrigues me very much: the military camouflage canvas. The speech of mimesis fascinates me as I think it underlines well that there are those who commit and those who prevent crime, those who have expiated and those who escape. As in the Matrix, my B-boys live their lives. A sort of Sims, in which each of us is nobody, but part of everything. The search for my identity, which relies on the classic topos of "Know thyself" is treated through the complicated relationship between me and my B-Boys, in which the B-boys have taken the upper hand over me by enslaving and substituting themselves to me: now I am no longer able to distinguish myself from my characters, and this leads me to lose the consciousness of the ego. For the future I have in mind a lot of exciting and exciting projects ....... but their description saves me for the interview that Forbes will make me in 2068 and for the cover that I will dedicate to become the richest centenarian artist of the Planet. Please contact the artist directly Mario Loprete Address: Via Magenta 31, 88100 CATANZARO. Tel. +390961781257, cell. +393404741434 e-mail [email protected] |
b-boy oil on canvas 60 x 90 cm
fabri fibra oil on concrete diameter 25 cm
j-ax oil on concreo cement 20 X 30 CM
concrete sculptures |