Marco Schifano, refined exhibition

Wednesday, 4 February 2015

Formal precision and refined photographic set preparation. Two important features of the works of Marco Schifano on display from 1 October 2014 to 21 March 2015 at Studio Giangaleazzo Visconti in Milan (corso Monforte, 23). The exhibition showcases 35 photographs of the Roman artist who, although working with the tools of photography, moves following an ancient manual technique, like a Renaissance Old Master or a Flemish painter. Balancing between photography, film editing and painting, these images also address the mechanism of theatrical dramatization and represent both the artist’s own subjectivity and the aspiration to objectivity of the individual parts. “There is a deep sense of adventure that animates the works of Marco Schifano” the critic Gianluca Ranzi states “The adventure consists also in the creation of images that contrast the instantaneous speed of the shot to the long time required by the complex preparation of each set, of the lights, rare plants, live animals that appear, even amplified by the almost total absence of digital post-production interventions on the photographs taken. ” Topics include animals, whether they are common (goats, geese, frogs), or rare and fierce (lions, armadillos, crocodiles, vultures) and plants (plants, flowers, fruits) that Schifano combines with inanimate objects such as furniture, crystal glasses, silverware, musical instruments, neo-Gothic benches, and more, in a kind of ongoing dialogue that leads to interaction on the same level between inanimate objects and living subjects, in a subtle play between reality and fiction. An unconventional exhibition, where the sophisticated images clearly show the artist’s deep sense of composition and beauty and the magic of the prodigious photographic reproduction of textures, materials and reflections.